Almost 30 countries vulnerable to a new Ebola-style Epidemic, jeopardising the future of millions of Children – Save the children
Almost 30 countries are highly vulnerable to an Ebola-style epidemic jeopardising the future of millions of children, warns Save the Children in its new report ‘A Wake Up Call: Lessons from Ebola for the world’s health systems’.
The report ranks the world’s poorest countries on the state of their public health systems, finding that 28 have weaker defences in place than Liberia where, alongside Sierra Leone and Guinea, the current Ebola crisis has already claimed 9,000 lives, and provoked an extraordinary international response to help contain it.
The agency warns that an increasingly mobile population intensifies the threat of infectious disease outbreaks and, added to the emergence of two new zoonotic diseases each year – those that can be passed between animals and humans - it is crucial to invest in stronger health systems to avoid a virus spreading faster and further than the current Ebola outbreak.
The report also advises that prevention is better than cure, finding that the international Ebola relief effort in West Africa has cost $4.3bn, whereas strengthening the health systems of those countries in the first place would have cost just $1.58bn.
Ahead of an Ebola summit attended by world leaders in Brussels today, the charity warns that alongside immediate much needed support to Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, lessons need to be learnt and applied to other vulnerable countries around the world.
Justin Forsyth, Save the Children’s CEO, said: “A robust health system could have stopped Ebola in its tracks saving thousands of children’s lives and billions of pounds.
“Without trained health workers and a functioning health system in place, it’s more likely that an epidemic could spread across international borders with catastrophic effects.
“The world woke up to Ebola but now people need to wake up to the scandal of weak health systems, which not only risk new diseases spreading, but also contribute to the deaths of 17,000 children each day from preventable causes like pneumonia and malaria.”
The reports’ index looks at the numbers of health workers, government spending on health, and mortality rates. Somalia ranks lowest, and is preceded by Chad, Nigeria, Afghanistan, Haiti, Ethiopia, Central Africa Republic (CAR), Guinea, Niger, and Mali.
In a snapshot of dangerously inadequate global health systems the index shows:
In Afghanistan, public spending on health is just $10.71 per person per year, compared to $3,099 in the UK; and
In Somalia, there is one health worker for every 6,711 people – by comparison in the UK there is one health worker for every 88 people.
As well as rebuilding the fractured health systems of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea following the Ebola crisis, Save the Children is calling for:
The international community to make a clear commitment to Universal Health Coverage for every country – the principle that every person should have access to essential health care, not just those that can afford it – including the IMF encouraging countries to collect progressive taxes and increase investments in public health services;
Countries to increase domestic tax revenue to 20% of GDP and allocate at least 15% of their national budgets to health;
Donors to ensure that the aid they give is better aligned and contributes to building comprehensive primary healthcare systems;
The new Sustainable Development Goals – which will replace the Millennium Development Goals, due to be negotiated at the UN General Assembly in New York in September – to explicitly include a commitment to Universal Health Coverage; and, · World leaders to commit to end preventable maternal, new-born and child deaths by 2030.
ENDS
Notes to editors:
$4.3bn is taken from Dr David Nabarro’s UN report called ‘Resources for Results’ produced with McKinsey in December 2014.
$1.58bn is the amount needed to provide the minimum package of essential health services for all in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia (which the WHO recommends is $86/person).
The Health Access Index ranks the 75 ‘Countdown Countries’, which shoulder 95% of global maternal, new-born, and child deaths. A coalition of institutions including Save the Children, The WHO, and The Lancet chart their annual progress towards MDGs 4&5.
‘Health workers’ include doctors, nurses and/or midwives.
‘Zoonotic diseases’ are defined by the Centre for Disease Control as diseases ‘that can be passed between animals and humans’.
‘Universal Health Coverage’ is defined by the WHO as ‘to ensure that all people obtain the health services they need without suffering financial hardship when paying for them’.
17,000 children under five die every day, according to UNICEF Child Mortality Report 2014.