Here is some worthwhile weekend reading! Perfect for lounging out and sipping a cup of tea at a local coffee shop!
The Population Research Bureau (PRB) put out a policy brief called “Ending the Neglect of Neglected Tropical Diseases.” The paper gives a good introduction and breakdown of NTDs, its global impact and the cost-effective and efficient solutions available now to help tackle them.
Check it out here
© UNICEF/ HQ96-1400/ Pirozzi
This week marks the 5th annual World Orphan Week sponsored by SOS Children’s Villages, the world’s largest charity dedicated to the long-term care and prevention of orphaned and abandoned children.
According to UNICEF, an estimated 143 million children worldwide are orphans due to natural disaster, conflict, disease and poverty and another 100 million abandoned children live on the streets. SOS Children’s Villages works in 132 countries worldwide providing shelter, emotional support, education and medical care to orphans to ensure that they have a brighter future.
We are especially mindful of the plight of orphaned and abandoned children in Haiti which were already at about 380,000 prior to the January 12th earthquake, and the long-term consequences this vulnerable population faces. Poverty and lack of a support system only exacerbate the challenges orphaned and abandoned children face, increasing their susceptibility to prevalent neglected tropical diseases in Haiti. Now, more than ever, children around the world need our support.
World Orphan Week sheds light on the issues faced by orphaned and abandoned children worldwide and provides the opportunity to help make a difference in the lives of the world’s most vulnerable population.
As we dig ourselves out and are settling back into the office after unprecedented amount of snow hit Washington DC this past week, here is what we’ve been reading.
Surprisingly, modern science has thus far only successfully eradicated one disease—smallpox—but recent developments hint that the world is close to eradicating another devastating infection—Guinea worm. This parasite, which has plagued communities for centuries, causes painful wounds and has the potential to cause disability, infection, and death, but thanks to recent concentrated global efforts, Guinea worm may soon become the first parasitic disease to be eradicated.
One very encouraging sign came last December when the World Health Organization (WHO) declared that Uganda had successfully eradicated Guinea worm within its borders. Uganda—which saw its last case of Guinea worm in 2003—joins seven other nations formally certified by the WHO as having eradicated the disease. Even more encouraging is the claim that in 2009 Nigeria experienced zero cases of Guinea worm. This makes Nigeria the 14th of 19 nations previously identified as endemic with the parasite to have recently eliminated the disease within its borders. Should Nigeria continue to be free of Guinea worm for the next several years, it will be WHO certified as having successfully eradicated the disease. Considering that Niger had only 3 cases of Guinea worm in 2009, it’s clear that the campaign to eradicate Guinea worm has been a great success thus far.
And this success was the result of the combined work of the Carter Center, the United States Center for Disease Control, WHO, and UNICEF, as well as other organizations and individuals. With similar efforts, other parasitic worms, including those in the destructive soil-transmitted helminths family, could be controlled, and perhaps one day eradicated altogether.
On the heels of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s $10 billion commitment to fund vaccine research, development and delivery throughout the developing world, a leading pneumonia expert, Dr. Thomas Cherian of the World Health Organization (WHO), was honored Monday in Geneva for his efforts to accelerate access to vaccines preventing pneumococcal disease, the world’s leading vaccine-preventable killer of children under age five.
Over the course of a 25-year career that began at the Christian Medical College in Tamil Nadu, India, Dr. Cherian, who currently serves as coordinator of the Expanded Programme on Immunization at the WHO, has made significant contributions and remained committed to fighting pneumonia and pneumococcal diseases. Last year, he led efforts to produce the first-ever country-by-country estimates of pneumococcal disease burden. This work found that in India, for example, more than 140,000 children die each year of pneumococcal disease — approximately one child every four minutes in India alone.
Dr. Cherian received the Pneumococcal Awareness Council of Expert’s (PACE) Global Leadership Award, which recognizes an individual, organization or country that has championed pneumococcal disease prevention and made a significant contribution towards policies that advance the introduction of pneumococcal conjugate vaccines. Pneumococcal disease is a leading cause of pneumonia which kills an estimated 2 million children under age five each year.
The contributions of individuals to the health field are not always publicized but it’s the efforts of individuals like Dr. Cherian that add to the collective goal of reducing deaths from preventable and treatable diseases, whether infectious or neglected.
The Global Network and PACE are initiatives of the Sabin Vaccine Institute, whose mission is to reduce needless human suffering from infectious and neglected tropical diseases.
Today we’re reading about the fallout from Monday’s unveiling of the fiscal year 2011 budget and various analysis of how it will impact the global health sector and NTDs in particular. We’re also reading about other miscellaneous developments in NTDs and global health.
With the release of Obama’s proposed FY11 budget yesterday and the $155 million allocated to NTDs specifically, we’re reading many different articles about the Administration’s 9% increase in global health funding. We’re also reading about the recent $13 million grant that the Gates Foundation has given to The Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis to eliminate elephantiasis (lymphatic filariasis) and river blindness (onchocerciasis), in the developing world. Lots of exciting things happening for the NTD community!
Listen to Dr. Hotez’s interview on WNYC radio’s Leonard Lopate show to discuss hookworm, national security, and why investing in NTDs is a “best buy” in public health!
http://www.wnyc.org/shows/lopate/episodes/2010/01/28/segments/149041
Throughout the past two weeks there has been an enormous outpouring of international support and relief to Haiti. Though the efforts are continuing to make a significant difference and impact, it still doesn’t seem to be enough.
Many of us have seen the striking images coming out of Haiti—trucks full of bodies literally pouring corpses into mass graves. Workers in one graveyard claimed to be burying about 10,000 bodies in mass graves everyday. The urgency to quickly bury the bodies is understandable-the stench of the decaying corpses is unbearable and many fear the health risks associated with being exposed to them. However, while these graves may appear to be the solution, many health experts claim that those who are still alive are at little or no disease risk from the exposed corpses.
The WHO released a report saying, “After most natural disasters, there is fear that dead bodies will cause epidemics. This belief is wrongly promoted by the media, as well as some medical and disaster professionals.” Although bodies should not be left exposed for indefinite periods, in case of diarrhea associated with water contamination, the largest health risks do not come from the dead, but instead from the living. We will surely see epidemic levels of many infectious and tropical diseases in Haiti due to a lack of clean water, sanitation or hygiene. Many Haitians have been displaced, there is crowding, and in many places local infrastructure has been completely destroyed. Many Haitians don’t have access to clean water or sanitary places to use the bathroom and the consequences of this problem will become all too evident in the near future.
Therefore, the WHO urges health workers in Haiti to focus on treating the living first, and organizations like the Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders are protesting the mass graves, saying that families should have an opportunity to first identify the bodies.
The majority of the bodies that are being hauled into the mass graves remain unidentified. In a country where most people are Catholic and over half the population practices Voodoo, funeral rites are extremely sacred, and survivors fear that the spirits of the dead are trapped without a proper burial. The rushed disposal of these bodies is extremely traumatic for families who have lost loved ones. One reporter writes, “In a country where proper burials are sacred and often festive, the mass disposal is an added horror.”
While we cannot forget that the burden of disease will continue to be exacerbated by the effects of the earthquake and we must continue to bring vital supplies and aid to the living, we also cannot forget that the earthquake has also taken a toll on the religious and cultural rituals of the Haitian people. It’s taken away their ability to grieve and honor those who they loved.
“The Haitian people are wounded,” said Max Beauvoir, Haiti’s chief Voodoo priest. “They are not just wounded in their body alone, they are wounded in their spirit.”
Today, Dr. Peter Hotez was published in the current issue of Foreign Policy. In his article entitled “Gandhi’s Hookworms,” Hotez looks at “the deep connection between medical health and the promotion of international peace and security.” He notes that neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) are endemic in areas of the world that are major concerns in U.S. foreign policy. Dr. Hotez writes that, “The security risks created by high endemic rates of NTDs argue strongly for seeking low-cost solutions for their control and elimination.” Fortunately, some low cost solutions already exist and an individual can be comprehensively treated for just $0.50 a year.
The article goes on to say that while “given the geography of where NTDs are most highly endemic, the modest costs required, and the potential for promoting global security, linking NTD control and elimination with U.S. foreign-policy goals makes a lot of sense.” Dr. Hotez calls on the federal government to increase NTD treatment funding from its current level at less than 1% of the U.S. global health budget. “The low cost for NTD control and elimination efforts and the potentially high return in terms of global security suggest that such activities could eventually be integrated into the missions of the Department of State and the Department of Defense, especially as their policies relate to the OIC and nuclear weapons states.” With rising deficits and a need for concrete, results based programming, investments into NTD treatment and elimination will serve both the U.S. and our international counterparts well.
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