WHO chief urges fight against "neglected" diseases
Pastor Dale Morgan
Thursday February 1, 7:18 PM Reuters*
WHO chief urges fight against "neglected" diseases*
BANGKOK (Reuters) - The head of the World Health Organisation (WHO)
called on Thursday for a stepped up fight against "neglected" diseases
afflicting 1 billion people, mainly in poor countries.
Margaret Chan, who took over as head of the U.N. agency last month, said
"ancient and entrenched" diseases in the developing world caused far
greater human suffering than emerging threats such as SARS and bird flu.
"But here is the difference: the neglected tropical diseases do not
threaten international health and security," Chan told a health
conference in Bangkok.
"They do not flare up in outbreaks with high mortality. They do not grab
media headlines. They do not travel abroad or threaten international
security," she said.
Chan named six diseases that maim, blind, disfigure and kill millions of
the world's poor but are rarely seen in wealthier countries with higher
living standards and better health care. They included "snail fever", or
schistosomiasis, which is caused by a parasite and leaves people so weak
they can't work.
It affects 160 million people in Africa alone, Chan said.
More than 40 million people, mainly in Africa and Asia, are disfigured
by lymphatic filariasis, a parasitic disease that causes grotesque
swelling of limbs.
These and other diseases are often neglected by drug companies, which
had little incentive to develop drugs and vaccines for markets that
cannot pay, Chan said.
When cheap and effective drugs do exist, she said, access was hampered
by weak or non-existent health systems.
Chan said drug companies and governments have had some success in
tackling these problems through public/private partnerships, but more
needed to be done.
She called for more resources to expand the delivery of existing
medicines and increased research into new treatments for neglected diseases.
Some health advocacy groups say publicly funded research plays a huge
role in the development of new drugs and vaccines and governments should
ensure more money is spent on fighting diseases that affect poor countries.
In a report issued last April, the Global Forum for Health Research said
international experts found only 10 percent of the world's resources for
health research was spent on solving health problems in the developing
world, where 90 percent of curable diseases are found.