SAY NO TO COVID-19 & SAY YES TO VACCINE!
COVID-19 is exposing deadly gaps in global public health
COVID-19 could have brought out the best in humanity. Instead, public health programs have fallen short, exposing us to a resurgence of diseases.
COVID-19 could have brought out the best in humanity. Instead, public health programs have fallen short, exposing us to a resurgence of diseases.
COVID-19 has shut down vaccination programs around the world. It has stifled aid efforts and emptied coffers of money meant to help prevent and treat diseases from tuberculosis to HIV.
In a perfect world, the coronavirus pandemic would have brought out the best humanity had to offer. As scientists raced to develop vaccines and treatments, governments would have poured trillions into beefing up public health systems in rich and poor countries alike.
They would have pooled resources to make sure no community was too poor or too remote or too unimportant to miss out on the opportunity to build new clinics, train new healthcare professionals, and set up the infrastructure needed to roll out tests, vaccines, and treatments.
This is obviously not a perfect world.
Not only has public health fallen apart in underdeveloped nations, but even the richest nations of the world have failed spectacularly to rise to the challenge.
While vaccine development has been lightning fast — and the new vaccines are stunningly effective — the development of tests, protocols to control the spread of the virus, and of treatments has trailed behind. Vaccine distribution is slow and heavily weighted towards a few wealthy nations.
Worse, the confusion and expense of the pandemic have damaged other public health efforts, decimated the ranks of health workers, and emptied the coffers of the World Health Organization (WHO) and other groups that had already been struggling to boost public health.
Millions of children have missed routine immunizations.
What does that mean for the future?
Many experts are predicting a new pandemic — one a little less obvious but spawned directly by COVID-19. It’s a pandemic of infectious diseases that the world had controlled, if not conquered, through sustained vaccination efforts.
In July, the WHO reported that 23 million children around the world had missed their routine immunizations against infections such as measles, polio, and diphtheria because of the pandemic.
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