Dark Horse
In Memoriam
WHO Tries to Focus on Bird Flu But Remains Vigilant Elsewhere
By NICHOLAS ZAMISKA
September 19, 2006; Page B2
AUCKLAND, New Zealand -- The World Health Organization is struggling to maintain the public's focus on the risk of a bird-flu pandemic without letting a single -- and still largely hypothetical -- threat overshadow the rest of its ambitious public health agenda.
High on that agenda are diseases such as tuberculosis that, unlike bird flu, already infect millions of people each year.
"The WHO should not lose focus," said Chua Soi Lek, Malaysia's minister of health and one of the scores of senior officials attending a weeklong regional conference of the WHO here.
Dr. Chua said the WHO has overemphasized the threat from bird flu at the expense of other, more pressing diseases such as AIDS, TB and malaria, which he says "don't have any glamour anymore -- they're not sexy. I'm not saying avian flu is not important, but we should have a balance....I have colleagues who have reservations, but they don't want to say it because they don't want to offend the WHO."
Richard Nesbit, the WHO's acting regional director for the Western Pacific, told reporters that the risk of a bird-flu pandemic "continues unabated. After three years now, I'm sure many journalists and the public are starting to get tired of the same message" -- that a global outbreak could strike at any time -- "but we have an obligation to keep giving this message."
In January, mounting concern about a possible global outbreak of avian influenza, stoked in large part by experts at the WHO, prompted countries around the world to pledge about $1.9 billion for bird flu. Much of that funding has yet to materialize, partly because the pandemic for which it was earmarked hasn't shown strong signs of materializing either.
Full article (subscription)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115860498628466517.html?mod=todays_us_marketplace
The rest of the article talks about how WHO sees more pressing health problems like AIDS, diabetes, and environmental problems and is shifting the agency's emphasis towards these other health problems. The article cites a study in Emerging Infectious Diseases concerning a 2005 case in Cambodia on why H5N1 has not evolved into a pandemic strain. Dr. Nordstrom, acting director general of WHO, says the world is in a "down period" of bird flu cases.
By NICHOLAS ZAMISKA
September 19, 2006; Page B2
AUCKLAND, New Zealand -- The World Health Organization is struggling to maintain the public's focus on the risk of a bird-flu pandemic without letting a single -- and still largely hypothetical -- threat overshadow the rest of its ambitious public health agenda.
High on that agenda are diseases such as tuberculosis that, unlike bird flu, already infect millions of people each year.
"The WHO should not lose focus," said Chua Soi Lek, Malaysia's minister of health and one of the scores of senior officials attending a weeklong regional conference of the WHO here.
Dr. Chua said the WHO has overemphasized the threat from bird flu at the expense of other, more pressing diseases such as AIDS, TB and malaria, which he says "don't have any glamour anymore -- they're not sexy. I'm not saying avian flu is not important, but we should have a balance....I have colleagues who have reservations, but they don't want to say it because they don't want to offend the WHO."
Richard Nesbit, the WHO's acting regional director for the Western Pacific, told reporters that the risk of a bird-flu pandemic "continues unabated. After three years now, I'm sure many journalists and the public are starting to get tired of the same message" -- that a global outbreak could strike at any time -- "but we have an obligation to keep giving this message."
In January, mounting concern about a possible global outbreak of avian influenza, stoked in large part by experts at the WHO, prompted countries around the world to pledge about $1.9 billion for bird flu. Much of that funding has yet to materialize, partly because the pandemic for which it was earmarked hasn't shown strong signs of materializing either.
Full article (subscription)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115860498628466517.html?mod=todays_us_marketplace
The rest of the article talks about how WHO sees more pressing health problems like AIDS, diabetes, and environmental problems and is shifting the agency's emphasis towards these other health problems. The article cites a study in Emerging Infectious Diseases concerning a 2005 case in Cambodia on why H5N1 has not evolved into a pandemic strain. Dr. Nordstrom, acting director general of WHO, says the world is in a "down period" of bird flu cases.
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that these world health leaders would actually say this stuff.
