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https://theconversation.com/like-covid-tb-is-a-pandemic-and-must-be-treated-as-an-emergency-177559>
"In 1993, the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared tuberculosis (TB) a
global public health emergency. It urged nations to coordinate efforts to avert
millions of deaths.
In January 2020, the WHO declared COVID-19, another airborne infectious
disease, a public health emergency of international concern.
The similarity between the global responses to these two pandemics ends there.
The scientific, public health, medical, and pharmaceutical communities’
responses to COVID-19 in the past two years has been spectacular.
Within two weeks of declaring COVID-19 a global emergency, the WHO had convened
a meeting of experts and issued a research roadmap. National governments
rapidly committed vast sums of money into research at all levels, from basic
virology and immunology to clinical care and prevention. Pharmaceutical
companies launched development programmes for new products to diagnose, treat
and prevent COVID-19.
As a result, diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines were developed at a
dizzying pace, delivering an array of tools to control and end the SARS-CoV-2
pandemic.
The effective and equitable deployment of those tools is a challenge. But no
one can say that science has been found wanting in responding to the global
crisis.
TB, on the other hand, has not been treated as a true emergency. Yet its
worldwide distribution, impact on health, and mortality burden was just as
dire. TB incidence remains plateaued at 10 million cases per year. In 2020 case
detection fell by almost 20% and mortality rose for the first time in a decade
to 1.5 million deaths. These setbacks are directly attributable to the COVID-19
pandemic."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
