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Global health chief Margaret Chan warned the world on
Monday not to drop its guard against a possible flu pandemic,
highlighting the fact that 2006 was a record year for human bird-flu
deaths.
The warning should resonate among
health officials in the Philippines which does not have an adequate
bird-flu preparedness plan.
There were 161 deaths from bird
flu worldwide in 2006 out of 267 confirmed cases, according to World
Health Organization (WHO) data.
“More deaths occurred in 2006
than in the previous years combined,” the WHO director general
said.
The fatality rate reached 70
percent last year, 10 percent above the average since the first
recorded deaths in China and Vietnam in 2003.
“The message is
straightforward: we must not let down our guard,” Chan said at the
opening of the WHO’s executive board meeting.
“As long as the virus continues
to circulate in birds, the threat of a pandemic will persist. The
world is years away from control in the agricultural sector,” she
warned.
Chan said countries with large
outbreaks in poultry flocks had largely failed to eliminate the
virus from their territories, despite “heroic efforts.”
“This may mean that we have
some more years in which to improve preparedness, or it may not.
Influenza viruses are notoriously sloppy, unstable, and capricious.
It is impossible to predict their behavior,” she said.
Scientists fear that the growing
number of human cases could enable the H5N1 virus to develop into a
far more contagious strain that might trigger a global pandemic,
potentially killing millions of people.
However, the virus still does not
transit easily from birds to humans and is essentially a disease of
birds for now, Ms. Chan said in a speech underlining her priorities
for the year ahead.
They include an emergency meeting
next month to launch a final drive to eradicate polio, and a bid for
more international cooperation to tackle the growing cross-border
impact of health problems.
“Shocks to health whether from
emerging infections, natural disasters or environmental change can
easily become greater and major shocks to the economy, societies and
business continuity around the globe,” Chan said.
The resurgence of polio in recent
years will be at the center of an “urgent, high-level” meeting
on February 27 to 28, Chan announced.
“The expected outcome is a set
of milestones that must be met if transmission is to be interrupted
in the four remaining endemic countries,” Chan said, insisting
that eradication was medically feasible.
“Polio eradication is one of
our most important areas of unfinished business,” she added.
The disease is endemic in
Afghanistan, India, Nigeria and Pakistan.
The number of polio cases has
grown again in recent years, reversing eradication efforts that were
meant to have come to fruition six years ago.
The disease spread into new
countries partly after immunization was temporarily interrupted in
Nigeria in 2004 and 2005 due to objections by local clerics.
Some 1,912 cases of polio were
recorded in 2006, compared to 1,831 the previous year, according to
the latest data from the Global Polio Eradication Initiative
spearheaded by the WHO.
The number of cases in endemic
countries more than doubled last year to 1,790, while the caseload
in other countries was cut from 997 to 122, especially in Indonesia
and Yemen, the data indicated.
Philippine health officials
should organize a detailed and clear national prepared plan.
Considering that Philippine
government departments directly involved in the bird-flu
problem—health and agriculture—appear to be too overloaded to
work on a national preparedness plan, The Manila Times has suggested
that the President consider transferring this responsibility to
another agency that has the technical, financial and enforcement
means.
Unless this step is taken the
Philippines cannot claim to have the beginnings of a preparedness
plan.
Philippine situation analysis
by The Times Op-ed staff added to an AFP report
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