WHO Report: Disease Epidemic More Likely Than Ever
The Annual Report published by the World Health Organization highlights how the spread of infectious diseases on the global stage is happening at a faster rate than at any other time in history. Based on current statistics that put the number of air travellers at 2.1 billion per year, there now exists, states the WHO, a high chance of a major outbreak of Sars, Aids, or Ebola fever occurring.
Consequently, the WHO stresses that heightened efforts are needed to prevent an epidemic developing, including the swapping of information to assist with the manufacture of vaccines. In the absence of this level of international cooperation, states the WHO, both the global economy and worldwide security could be irreversibly damaged.
The WHO’s report is titled ‘A Safer Future’. It details how new diseases are being discovered at a rate of one each year – a “historically unprecedented’ situation. 39 new diseases have emerged since the 1970s, but, moreover, since 2002, the WHO has established the presence of in excess of 1,100 epidemics, including bird flu, polio and cholera.
‘A Safer Future’ highlights how almost 50 per cent of the alerts concerning such outbreaks come from media sources, so consequently stresses the need for governments to be more transparent and proactive in reporting widespread cases of disease.
"It would be extremely naive and complacent to assume that there will not be another disease like Aids, another Ebola, or another Sars, sooner or later," states the report. It adds that shared medical information, practices and technological advancement, involving nations both wealthy and poor, is "one of the most feasible routes" towards guaranteeing the security of the health industry at large. As detailed in the report’s introduction: "Given today's universal vulnerability to these threats, better security calls for global solidarity. International public health security is both a collective aspiration and a mutual responsibility."
The issue of samples of H5N1 bird flu virus is, at present, engaging the WHO in an argument with Indonesia. The basis of this is that the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, will not share the samples it has produced with the WHO, based on its concerns that, consequently, drug companies could base vaccines on them that prove unaffordable.
Another factor highlighted in the report is the threat to the control of disease posed by resistance to drugs. The WHO attributes this to situations where antibiotics have been misused, and lacklustre medical treatment employed – citing tuberculosis as a prime example of this.
Source – Pharmaceutical International’s Health Expert
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