This Post is Not About Swine Flu

(photo credit: Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases)

With attention for global health almost overwhelmingly concentrated on swine flu, it's nice to see that people are still working on others issues that matter. I was contacted by the Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases to publicize an upcoming editorial in The Lancet. I am happy to do so:

Lancet "Viewpoint": Fighting Neglected Tropical Diseases is a Low-Cost Investment to Rescue More Than One Billion People in Poverty During these Difficult Economic Times

Washington, D.C., April 30, 2009 -  Leading tropical disease experts were featured in the May 2 edition of the medical journal The Lancet stressing the economic, global health and security, developmental and human rights case for investment in Neglected Tropical Disease control even in difficult economic times.

NTDs are devastating, debilitating and deadly parasitic and bacterial infections that adversely affect the poorest 1.4 billion people worldwide living on $1.25 a day.  Such conditions promote poverty because of their impact on child growth and development, pregnancy outcome, and worker productivity adversely effecting the earning capacity of already impoverished individuals and communities. The authors note that a 15-30% rate of economic return from control efforts in countries severely impacted by NTD has been demonstrated in many programs - a remarkable return on investment and one of the best in any area of development.

Moreover, a low-cost investment in fighting NTDs also makes a significant impact on other diseases including malaria and HIV/AIDS because of the broad effect of the medicines.  NTD control campaigns have successfully distributed medicines at a cost of often less than 50 cents per person per year enabling the treatment of seven of the most common NTDs while also building community-directed health networks, which in some cases, simultaneously distribute antimalarial bednets, childhood vaccinations and vitamin A.  The authors note that such "low costs and efficiencies will be especially welcomed in these new times of economic difficulties."

The authors comment that global financing mechanisms for NTDs should take into consideration that disease-control programs must be nationally owned, embedded in national health plans, and backed by political commitment. The World Health Organization and national health ministries should work together with partner organizations such as the Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases, major pharmaceutical companies who have generously donated highly effective drugs, often for as long as needed, as well as implementing non governmental organizations to ensure that national and local NTD control campaigns are successful.

The Lancet Viewpoint piece notes that the people who comprise "the bottom billion" of the world are often subsistence farmers who are "stuck in a poverty trap of disease, conflict and no education."  Almost everyone lives with at least one NTD in spite of the fact that low-cost treatments exists to prevent, treat, control and in some cases eliminate these devastating diseases.  The authors conclude that controlling and eventually eliminating most NTDs "will address a major development problem and bring hope to the most disenfranchised populations."

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Peter J. Hotez, Alan Fenwick, Lorenzo Savioli and David Molyneux authored the Lancet Viewpoint entitled "Rescuing the bottom billion through the control of neglected tropical diseases." The complete article can be viewed at www.globalnetwork.org.