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Facts
- World Health Day is 7 April.
- In the 1990s, child mortality was reduced by a third or more in 63
countries — in more than 100, it was cut by a fifth.
- If all the food produced worldwide were distributed equally, every
person would be able to consume 2,760 calories a day (hunger is defined
as consuming fewer than 1,960 calories a day).
- Every year more than 10 million children, 30,000 a day, die of preventable
illnesses.
- Malaria deaths, now 1 million a year, could double in the next 20
years.
- Around the world 42 million people are living with HIV/AIDS, 39 million
of them in developing countries, three quarters of them are in Sub-Saharan
Africa, where the rate has almost reached one in ten adults, or more
for some countries.
- Tuberculosis remains (along with AIDS) the leading infectious killer
of adults, causing up to 2 million deaths a year.
- More children have died through diarrhoeal disease during the 1990s
than all people lost in conflict since World War 2.
Source: http://www.undp.org/
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Background
According to the World Health Organisation: "Health is a state of complete
physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease
or infirmity." The health of populations has many links with other sectors,
such as education, water and sanitation and gender.
Poverty is an important economic and social problem as it is both a cause and
an effect of poor health. The poor suffer more and face more serious consequences
from ill health and also as a consequence of their country’s incapacity to provide
basic health services.
Great gains in health have been made over the last fifty years as the result
of improvements in income and education, with accompanying improvements in nutrition,
access to contraceptives, hygiene, housing, water supplies, and sanitation.
The underlying threats to good health are well known and affordable solutions
are frequently available but because of weak government capacity potentially
effective policies and programs often fail.
Some of the key health areas are:
Public health systems
Most developed countries spend 5.5% to 8.0% of their GDP on health while the
least developed countries spend 1.0% to 3.0%. These differences in expenditure
are reflected in the quality of the delivery and responsiveness of the health
systems and general health indicators for the population.
Nutrition
Access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food is an important way to prevent
malnutrition. Although often invisible, malnutrition affects close to 800 million
people worldwide, especially the poor. It mains, cripples, blinds and kills.
Young children are especially vulnerable to malnutrition, those surviving may
suffer ongoing disease and disability, affecting their ability to learn and
develop to their full potential.
Immunisation
Access to immunisation varies greatly across the world. A child in a developing
country is ten times more likely to die of a vaccine-preventable disease than
a child from an industrialised one. Immunisation is among the most cost-effective
interventions. Since the 1980s, considerable progress in immunisation against
measles, polio, pertussis, diphtheria, tetanus and tuberculosis, has been made,
although worldwide average vaccination coverage of children under five fell
from 80% in 1990 to 74% in 1999.
Malaria
Malaria causes at least 300 million cases of acute illness and one million
deaths each year, 90% of which are in Africa. It is the leading cause of deaths
in young children and is also particularly dangerous for pregnant women, causing
severe anaemia, miscarriages, stillbirths, low birth weight and maternal death.
HIV/AIDS
An estimated 42 million people are living with HIV/AIDS with 95% of global
infections in developing countries. HIV/AIDS threatens to reverse years of
development and put at risk the political stability and economic security of
these countries. It attacks people in their most productive years, destroys
communities, and disrupts food production. Heavy burdens are placed on already
weak health services.
Water and sanitation
At any one time about one-half of all people in developing countries are suffering
from diseases associated with water. Diseases may be caused by drinking water
contaminated by human or animal waste, insects which breed in water or parasites.
The energy expended carting water long distances also has a health and time
cost on women and children. Improved access to water and a knowledge of hygiene
and management practices can lead to improved health.
Australia's responses
The aim of the Australian aid health policy is to work with developing countries
to improve the health of the poor. Primary health care programs are the focus
of Australian health aid.
Primary health involves a wide variety of projects with a focus on: communicable
and vector-borne diseases especially HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria; women's and children's
health; non-communicable diseases and injuries; and assisting countries to develop
their health care programs.
In times of natural disasters and other emergencies, the Australian aid program
provides support. The aid program aims to deliver prompt, appropriate and effective
humanitarian and emergency assistance. They help to identify the problems and
to manage the support efforts. A longer-term goal is to assist countries to
prevent and prepare for natural disasters and emergencies.
See also: www.ausaid.gov.au/keyaid/health.cfm
The global agenda
The Millennium Development Goals
The Millennium Development Goals grew out of the agreements and resolutions
of world conferences organised by the United Nations in the past decade and
have been accepted as a framework for measuring development progress.
The first seven goals are either health and nutrition status indicators or
health outcomes.
Strengthening health systems
Many projects aim to strengthen
health systems as a means of improving efficiency in the management and use
of health resources. In most countries, health sector reforms have included:
- organisational reforms - restructuring of the ministry of health and decentralisation
of planning, budgeting authority, control of financial resources and responsibility
for implementation of program activities;
- health financing reforms - cost sharing, user fees, and public and private
health insurance mechanisms;
- increased partnerships with communities and private health-care providers.
The Expanded Programme on Immunization
This programme targets mainly six communicable diseases of childhood
and has reduced the share of these six diseases in the total burden of disease
among children under five from about 23% in the mid-1970s, to less than 10%
in 2000. To fully immunize a child against the six diseases costs about US$17,
making immunisation one of the most affordable interventions available.
UN Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria
Funds raised will support
proven interventions against the three diseases. It will provide over 500,000
people living with HIV/AIDS with anti-retroviral treatment and provide medical
and educational support for half a million children orphaned due to AIDS. It
will also enable the detection and treatment of two million additional cases
of tuberculosis, and deliver 20 million combination drug treatments for drug-resistant
malaria.
Roll Back Malaria
Roll Back Malaria (RBM)
is a global partnership founded in 1998 by the World Health Organization (WHO),
the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the United Nations Children's
Fund (UNICEF) and the World Bank with the goal of halving the world's malaria
burden by 2010. The RBM partnership includes national governments, civil society
and non-governmental organizations, research institutions, professional associations,
UN and development agencies, development banks, the private sector and the media.
RBM was founded in response to a growing concern by governments, particularly
in Africa, about the continuing and increasing burden of disease and death due
to malaria.
http://mosquito.who.int
HIV/AIDS
Live and let live’ is the
slogan of the two-year World AIDS Campaign 2002-2003, which will focus on eliminating
stigma and discrimination by encouraging people to break the silence and the
barriers to effective HIV/AIDS prevention and care.
The World Bank is working with its partners to:
- Prevent the further spread of HIV/AIDS among vulnerable groups and in the
general population;
- Promote countries' health policies and multi-sectoral approaches (eg by
working in education, social safety nets, transport and other vital areas);
- Expand basic care and treatment activities for those affected by HIV/AIDS
and their families, as well as for children whose parents have died of AIDS
and other vulnerable children.
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