New York: The United Nations General Assembly will hold three high-level meetings on health this year on key concerns, including pandemic preparedness, Universal Health Coverage and ending the TB epidemic by 2030. “All three are among the eight flagship priority programmes that the WHO South-East Asia Region had identified in 2014 in discussion with Member countries,” World Health Organisation’s Regional Director for South-East Asia Poonam Khetrapal Singh said in a statement on Thursday (September 21).
However, the first high-level meeting on pandemic preparedness is an the statement said,
opportunity for world leaders to forge a common path forward to prevent a repeat of the devastation wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Universal Health Coverage stands necessary as COVID-19 demonstrated that the health and well-being of all people is the foundation of prosperous, equitable and sustainable societies and economies, it said. According to Ms. Singh,
We need to focus on accelerating efforts to ensure that everyone, everywhere receives good quality health services, when and where needed, without incurring financial hardship.
Lastly, the third health issue is to identify gaps and solutions to the statement said,
accelerate progress towards ending the Tuberculosis epidemic by 2030 and ensure equitable access to prevention, testing, treatment, and care.
Moreover, it is relevant to the WHO Southeast Asia Region in view of its disproportionate burden of TB cases and deaths.
These programmes are receiving focused attention and action. “Much has been done. Much more is needed,” the statement added.
Meanwhile, new solutions are needed for the countries to deliver health for all to make progress on their wide agenda for sustainable development. She said,
The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that global actors in the multilateral system, working differently and collaborating more robustly, can achieve ambitious goals and establish a pivot point for global health.
Furthermore, these high-level meetings are opportunities to commit to these key priorities, to collaborate, to explore innovative ways of overcoming challenges and to provide an impetus to the existing efforts, she added.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
NDTV – Dettol have been working towards a clean and healthy India since 2014 via the Banega Swachh India initiative, which is helmed by Campaign Ambassador Amitabh Bachchan. The campaign aims to highlight the inter-dependency of humans and the environment, and of humans on one another with the focus on One Health, One Planet, One Future – Leaving No One Behind. It stresses on the need to take care of, and consider, everyone’s health in India – especially vulnerable communities – theLGBTQ population,indigenous people, India’s different tribes, ethnic and linguistic minorities, people with disabilities, migrants, geographically remote populations, gender and sexual minorities. In wake of the currentCOVID-19 pandemic, the need for WASH (Water,SanitationandHygiene) is reaffirmed as handwashing is one of the ways to prevent Coronavirus infection and other diseases. The campaign will continue to raise awareness on the same along with focussing on the importance of nutrition and healthcare for women and children, fightmalnutrition, mental wellbeing, self care, science and health,adolescent health & gender awareness. Along with the health of people, the campaign has realised the need to also take care of the health of the eco-system. Our environment is fragile due to human activity, which is not only over-exploiting available resources, but also generating immense pollution as a result of using and extracting those resources. The imbalance has also led to immense biodiversity loss that has caused one of the biggest threats to human survival – climate change. It has now been described as a “code red for humanity.” The campaign will continue to cover issues likeair pollution,waste management,plastic ban,manual scavengingand sanitation workers andmenstrual hygiene. Banega Swasth India will also be taking forward the dream of Swasth Bharat, the campaign feels that only a Swachh or clean India wheretoiletsare used andopen defecation free (ODF)status achieved as part of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan launched byPrime Minister Narendra Modiin 2014, can eradicate diseases like diahorrea and the country can become a Swasth or healthy India.
