Text: Disease Treatment a Way Out of Poverty, U.N. Report Says

01 February 2002

Text: Disease Treatment a Way Out of Poverty, U.N. Report Says

Study urges heightened global response to disease

A new report from U.N. health and social agencies calls for a global campaign to widely expand proven disease-fighting strategies in order to improve health and accelerate economic and social development.

The report, "Scaling Up the Response to Infectious Disease: A Way Out of Poverty," is being presented at the World Economic Forum in New York City February 2. The report was made public by the World Health Organization (WHO) and other U.N. agencies February 1.

An earlier report from WHO established a link between health and economic development, and maintained that national investments in health will save lives and produce clear economic benefits.

The introduction to the latest report says, "Ongoing ill-health is one of the main reasons why the poor stay poor. Infections lead to poverty, and poverty leads to infections."

The report says HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis kill almost 6 million people a year. Treatments to reduce that cost in lives are well known, the report says, if investments in those methods could be expanded.

To achieve that goal, the report suggests a new network of private-public partnerships to increase investments in health and improve disease-prevention education.

The report is available in full at http://www.who.int/infectious-disease-report/index.html

The following text is available in French at http://www.who.int/inf/fr/cp-2002-06.html

The following terms are used in the text:

Billion: 1,000 million

Following is the text of the WHO release:

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WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION

Press Release

31 January 2002

WHO REPORT OUTLINES PLAN FOR NEW HEALTH SPENDING -- POINTS TO WAY OUT OF POVERTY

"Today, perhaps for the first time in history, it is possible to launch a truly global response to the major infectious diseases that keep people in poverty."

So begins Scaling Up the Response to Infectious Diseases: A Way out of Poverty, a new report by the World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, UNAIDS, the World Bank, UNESCO and UNFPA. The report will be launched at the World Economic Forum in New York on Saturday 2 February.

Scaling Up calls for a well-organized and highly focused effort to take proven strategies and massively increase their availability.

"Almost 6 million people are killed every year by HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis (TB) and malaria alone," says Carol Bellamy, UNICEF's Executive Director. "Malaria and HIV are some of the major causes of stagnating, and in some cases, rising infant and under-five mortality in Africa. Tackling these, as well as addressing other important childhood disease will be essential to reaching the Millennium Development Goals for children."

Yet by expanding the use of known and cost-effective interventions, TB and malaria deaths can be cut in half and new HIV infections in young people can be reduced by 25% in a decade, Scaling up reports. It details where investment can be made to realize these gains in a decade.

"These are investment guidelines for better health -- not just financial investment but investment in social and political will," says Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland, WHO's Director General. "It is about change on a global scale, brought about by change on a local scale. These are global problems but they can be solved by committed individuals working hard to bring about improvements in their own communities."

Scaling Up builds on the work of the Commission on Macroeconomics and Health, which was established by WHO to explore the links between health and economic development. In a report issued in December 2001, the Commission showed conclusively that investing in health in developing countries saves lives and produces clear and measurable financial returns. The Commission built on evidence that well-targeted spending of US$ 66 billion a year by 2015 could save as many as 8 million lives a year and generate six-fold economic benefits, more than US$ 360 billion a year by 2020.

Scaling Up urges this new investment be applied to the existing tools including drugs to treat TB and HIV/AIDS, mosquito nets and condoms to prevent infection with malaria and HIV. It outlines the treatment strategies available and the health systems through which they can be delivered. It then suggests ways new resources could be better used and combined with novel marketing and communications approaches to encourage "healthy behavior".

Scaling Up also represents the broadening of the public health paradigm, expanding upon prevention with vaccines to treatment as a means of promoting health and attacking poverty.

This new acceptance for treatment as an effective public health investment has also opened up for a new era of public-private partnerships. As Dr. Brundtland has made clear since her first days as Director-General, this is not a battle that can be won by international organizations or governments alone. It is a truly global challenge to individuals, companies and organizations in every country, rich and poor.

The new focus on partnerships with the private sector is endorsed by a series of statements from leading companies and organizations:

"We hope that we will act as a catalyst, encouraging other companies to take a new look at the problems facing the world and to become involved in finding solutions to them ... No company can afford to stand by and watch or allow itself to hope that the efforts of others will provide a solution to this problem."

Thomas Wellauer, CEO, Credit Suisse Financial Services.

" Partnerships remain a crucial strategy to the improvement of health around the world. Partnerships lead to a coordination of efforts between the public and private sectors, draw on the complementary expertise of all stakeholders, and help put the systems and infrastructures in place to ensure long-term access to care and treatment."

Raymond V. Gilmartin, Chairman, President and CEO, Merck & Co., Inc.

"Small is Beautiful but, to us, large-scale is an imperative. We believe that change is possible; in fact, it is inevitable. The challenge is how fast this can happen and to the vast majority of the world's poor, women and children."

Mr F.H. Abed, Founder and Chair, Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee.

"We assist local authorities in building, restructuring and maintaining health facilities, supplying medicines and hospital equipment, training medical and non medical personnel, and by carrying out vaccination, health awareness campaigns and prevention and control activities for a range of infectious diseases."

Gian Maria Gros-Pietro, Chairman, Eni SpA

"We are moving technology and designing innovative agreements to ensure that new drugs will be affordable in endemic countries. We believe that the dividends of such a new model of doing 'good business' will translate into win-win results for both private and public players as well as a quantum leap forward in global health."

Maria C. Freire, CEO, The Global Alliance for TB Drug Development.

The full text of the report can be found from 12.00 CET on Friday 1 February on the Internet at: http://www.who.int/infectious-disease-report/index.html

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