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 A report by the Commission on Creating a Global Health Risk
Framework for the Future, published on Wednesday, said infectious
diseases are as potentially dangerous to human life, health and
society as match wars and natural disasters.
Pandemics cost the world more than 40 billion pounds ($58 billion)
each year, the report estimated, yet preparations are chronically
underfunded compared with other threats.
"Few global events match epidemics and pandemics in potential to
disrupt human security and inflict loss of life and economic and
social damage," said Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust
global health charity.
"Yet for many decades, the world has invested far less in
preventing, preparing for and responding to these threats than in
comparable risks to international and financial security."
The Wellcome Trust co-funded the review, which was coordinated by
the U.S. National Academy of Medicine, with the Bill & Melinda Gates
Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation and several other
organizations.
An Ebola epidemic killed more than 11,000 people and wreaked
economic and social havoc when it swept through three countries in
West Africa last year.
The world has faced several other infectious disease crises in the
last 15 years, the report noted, including Middle East Respiratory
Syndrome (MERS), severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), and the
HIN1 flu pandemic.
The commission's experts estimated that at least one new disease
pandemic will emerge in the next 100 years, with a 20 percent chance
of four or more in that time.
"Pandemics don't respect national boundaries, so we have a common
interest in strengthening our defenses," said Peter Sands of the
Mossavar-Rahmani Center for business and government at the Harvard
Kennedy school, who chaired the commission.
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Preventing and preparing for potentially catastrophic pandemics "is
far more effective, and ultimately far less expensive, than reacting
to them when they occur -- which they will," he added.
Farrar told a briefing in London that a crucial factor in preparing
for disease epidemics would be the creation of a strong, independent
center under the umbrella of the World Health Organization (WHO),
which would lead outbreak preparedness and response.
The new center, which he said could be set up within a year if
supported by the WHO and its 194 member states, should be a
permanent part of the WHO system but also have "considerable
operational independence and a sustainable budget".
"What we need to see now is action," Farrar said. "The WHO's
leadership and its member states must make 2016 the year in which we
learn the lessons of past epidemics and pandemics and implement
these valuable measures, to build a more resilient global health
system."
(Editing by Catherine Evans)
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