By DPA
Geneva : National borders no longer contain disease and governments must cooperate to provide global health security, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said in a report published Thursday.
In her introduction to the World Health Report 2007, entitled A Safer Future, WHO Director-General Margaret Chan said: “The disease situation is anything but stable.”
She said that profound changes such as population growth, rapid urbanization, intensive farming practices and environmental degradation had dramatically changed the world in the last 60 years. Before, new diseases were rare, and people travelled the world by ship.
“Airlines now carry more than two billion passengers annually, vastly increasing opportunities for the rapid international spread of infectious agents,” Chan said. “Vulnerability is universal.”
The speed of electronic news means that health shocks could destabilize economies and business.
As well as recurring outbreaks of familiar diseases, such as cholera and yellow fever, the international community need to be vigilant against new threats, the report found. Avian influenza, extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB) and HIV/AIDS all pose significant dangers, along with bio-terrorism, such as the anthrax letters in the US in 2001, and chemical and radiological accidents such as the Chernobyl meltdown.
“No single country – however capable, wealthy or technologically advanced – can alone prevent, detect and respond to all public-health threats,” the report states.
A global analysis or coordination at the international level might be necessary, as set out by revised International Health Regulations drawn up by WHO in 2005.
Collective responsibility and international cooperation in surveillance and outbreak alerting are essential, including open sharing of knowledge, technologies and virus samples, according to the report, to guarantee global public-health security in the future.