Comrades's blog

WHA Agenda Item 11.3 Public health, innovation and intellectual property: global strategy and plan of action Speaker: Michelle Childs, Director of Policy and Advocacy for the Access Campaign
Thank you Chair. Médecins Sans Frontières urges Members States not to allow the momentum that led to The Global Strategy and Plan of Action to be lost, and to overcome the fundamental problems associated with the current commercial- reward-driven R&D. It is vital that the leadership of the WHO prioritises the Strategy’s implementation and ensures that the appropriate resources and expertise within the secretariat are not only maintained but strengthened, including where relevant engaging the support of expert committees. In this work the WHO must also include a commitment to meaningful engagement with public interest groups.

Pandemic influenza preparedness: sharing of influenza viruses and access to vaccines and other benefits

Members States expressed strong support for the continuing efforts of the Open-Ended Working Group to further global pandemic influenza preparedness by strengthening the sharing of influenza viruses and of benefits such as vaccines. Member States spoke on the progress made at the recent intergovernmental meeting (held 10-12 May 2010) and characterized the interaction as transparent, substantive, collaborative and an important foundation for future negotiation in this area. The role of industry as a stakeholder in the process to increase global capacity for vaccine production, increased technology transfer to developing countries, and access to supplies of vaccine and medicines at affordable prices for resource-limited countries were among issues raised. A number of countries urged the collaboration to move forward to increase pandemic preparedness and protect global public health. Having considered the report of the Open-Ended Working Group (15 April 2010), the draft resolution was passed:

* to request the Director-General to continue to support the effort and undertake any technical consultations and studies as necessary; and
* to decide that the group will report through the Executive Board to the Sixty-fourth World Health Assembly.
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Implementation of the International Health Regulations (2005)

The first report of the of the review committee assessing the functioning of the International Health Regulations (IHR) during pandemic influenza was discussed and the chair, Dr Harvey Fineberg thanked Member States for their input so far in the committee's work.

MDG 6: combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
Target 6A. Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS
Target 6B. Achieve, by 2010, universal access to treatment for HIV/AIDS for all those who need it.
At the end of 2008, 33.4 million people were living with HIV. That same year, some 2.7 million people became newly infected, and 2.0 million died of AIDS, including 280 000 children. Two thirds of HIV infections are in sub-Saharan Africa where there are an estimated 6.7 million people needing antiretroviral therapy.
WHO is working with countries:
• to prevent people becoming infected with HIV – helping to change behaviours to reduce HIV risks; increasing access to prevention commodities; supporting programmes for prevention of mother to child transmission of HIV; promoting safe blood supplies and prevention of HIV transmission in health care settings; assessing new prevention technologies;
• to expand the availability of treatment;
• to provide the best care for people living with HIV/ AIDS and their families;
• to expand access and uptake of HIV testing and counselling so that people can learn their HIV status;
• to strengthen health care systems so that they can deliver quality and sustainable HIV/AIDS programmes and services; and
• to improve HIV/AIDS information systems, including HIV surveillance, monitoring and evaluation and operational research.
More about Target 6A and 6B
Target 6C. Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the incidence of malaria and other major diseases
Malaria

Malaria kills nearly one million people a year – most of them children under five in Africa. In fact, on average a child in Africa dies every 30 seconds from a malaria infection caused by the bite of a mosquito.
WHO urges three main strategies to tackle malaria:
• prevention with long-lasting insecticidal nets;
• prevention with indoor residual spraying; and
• rapid treatment with effective anti-malarial medicines.

Dinavance Kamukama, 28, in the photo, front right, with her cousins in Kampala, Uganda. She is on a waiting list for AIDS medication.Her disease is probably quite advanced: her kidneys are failing and she is so weak she can barely walk. Leaving her young daughter with family, she rode a bus four hours to the hospital where her cousin Allen Bamurekye, born infected, both works and gets the drugs that keep her alive. But there are no drugs for Ms. Kamukama. As is happening in other clinics in Kampala, all new patients go on a waiting list. A slot opens when a patient dies. “So many people are being supported by America,” Ms. Kamukama, 28, says mournfully. “Can they not help me as well?” The answer increasingly is no. Uganda is the first and most obvious example of how the war on global AIDS is falling apart.

Posted by Zackie Achmat: "A very important speech on corruption in government by Cosatu’s Zwelinzima Vavi. This deserves wide circulation even if you do not share his political views."
Vavi on Corruption: Culture of self-enrichment is caused by obscene levels of salaries, bonuses and perks for top executives, led to South Africa becoming the most unequal society Address by Zwelinzima Vavi, General Secretary of the Congress of South African Trade Unions, to SACP March Against Corruption, 30 April 2010:
"I must begin by warmly welcoming the initiative taken by the SACP to launch a campaign against corruption. COSATU is with you all the way. This is a campaign we absolutely must win. If we fail there is no hope of preventing the collapse of our democracy and a descent into a banana republic dictatorship.

A 'patient-friendly' doctor friend of the World Care Council, Francois Boillot, while stuck in New Caledonia because of volcanic ash clouds in Europe, sent us this link to a wonderful video from a MDR-TB patient in quarantine. If some of us who are put away in isolation because we are Fully Sick were to also use the time to raise awareness and maybe smiles, it could change some thinking about DR-TB, and change despair into dancing. MDR may also find some shining stars. Enjoy: http://www.youtube.com/user/ChristiaanVanVuuren

Link Between AIDS and Maternal Mortality Requires Policy Change
New York, USA - April 14, 2010 A study funded by the Gates Foundation, released today in The Lancet and showing welcome progress on reducing maternal mortality globally, also reveals one catastrophic exception. The good news in "Maternal mortality for 181 countries, 1980 - 2008"[i] is that worldwide deaths related to reproduction fell by one-third over the period studied. But that is tempered by bad news emerging from southern and eastern Africa: in the region of the world most heavily affected by the AIDS pandemic, HIV has not only blocked progress toward maternal health, but is responsible for an additional 61,000 maternal deaths per year.

LONDON (Reuters) – Donor money for health care in developing countries could be spent more effectively if it were channeled through a single global fund, experts said Friday. A steady flow of funds is essential for health sector improvements, Gorik Ooms from Belgium's Institute of Tropical Medicine said. Research by Ooms and other experts published in The Lancet medical journal Friday said the amount and regularity of international aid was often unpredictable, making it hard for governments to plan ahead. Another study, by Harvard Medical School and the University of Washington, found that in some recipient countries, mainly in sub-Saharan Africa, foreign health aid was partly replacing -- not supplementing -- domestic health budgets. In such countries, for every $1 given in aid, governments move between 43 cents and $1.14 of their own health funds to other sectors, such as education or sanitation.

Kathmandu is the most polluted city in Asia with respect to air quality. Every year, around 2,000 people die in Kathmandu because of carbon pollution related diseases; and the daily impact of carbon pollution on the population is massive. It affects all irrespective of gender, age, profession, social-economic status, political beliefs or religion. We all know how ugly our city is, but we are behaving as if we are not affected by it. The city has become a victim of political absurdity and intellectual delusion of its residents that undermines the daily needs of the population, and most importantly, our rights to healthy breathing. In such a city, we cannot imagine a healthy and prosperous life without changing its environment. We cannot ignore our health. Urban health matters to us.

I have just spent two days at a meeting in the Hague discussing with delegates from more than 30 countries and foundations why it is vital for the world to go on supporting the Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Although the hotel where we met was at times fogbound, the picture emerging from our meeting was crystal clear: the Global Fund is one of the great success stories in the history of global health. But we need more funding to win the fight against three devastating diseases that kill more than 5 million people every year. We all agreed that the results achieved since the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria was created eight years ago -- when practically no HIV treatment was available in poorer countries -- are extraordinary. I never thought we could increase access to HIV treatment and prevention this fast in so many developing countries.