MaximsNewsNetwork: PNEUMONIA WORLD DAY UNICEF

MaximsNewsNetwork: O2 October 2009 - UNICEF: WORLD PNEUMONIA DAY!!
More children die every day of pneumonia than of any other disease. UNICEF and the World Health Organization released a comprehensive plan, The Global Action Plan for Prevention and Control of Pneumonia (GAPP), to save millions of lives from this fatal illness. Robin Nandy, Senior Health Specialist for UNICEF discusses key components of the plan.

More children die every day of pneumonia than of any other disease, according to a joint report from UNICEF and the World Health Organization released today (2 November) at the Global Pneumonia Summit, which is underway in New York.

The Global Action Plan for Prevention and Control of Pneumonia (GAPP) is a comprehensive plan that could save millions of lives from this often fatal illness.

Announcing the action plans objective to reduce pneumonia mortality in children under the age of five by 65 per cent by 2015 UNICEF Senior Health Specialist Robin Nandy said that there are a number of behavioral good health practices that can protect children against pneumonia, including exclusive breastfeeding for young children.

SOUNDBITE (English) Robin Nandy, UNICEF Senior Health Specialist:
The Global Action Plan divides the intervention into three parts: interventions to protect children against the effects of pneumonia; interventions to prevent pneumonia; and interventions to treat pneumonia once children are affected by it. In terms of protecting children, there are a number of behavioral good health practices that can protect children against pneumonia; the simplest being exclusive breastfeeding for young children which can reduce the incidents of pneumonia.

GAPP calls for increasing those interventions known to be effective: exclusive breastfeeding, regular hand washing, and zinc supplementation.

In addition, it calls for a global expansion in access to preventive vaccines like measles and pneumococcal conjugate, and to antibiotic treatments for children who fall ill.
SOUNDBITE (English) Robin Nandy, UNICEF Senior Health Specialist:
Malnutrition attributes for as many as one third of all child deaths so it has effects even beyond pneumonia prevention. There are other behavior interventions including hand washing which can - were getting more and more evidence that that can reduce pneumonia, and hand washing can also reduce the incidence of diarrhea and other childhood diseases.

Pneumonia is a common and serious consequence of pandemic influenza. As such, the action plan urges health officials to include pneumonia contingencies and case management in their influenza preparedness strategies. Going forward, the plan envisions coordinated delivery of a package of interventions on a national level.
But progress will come at a cost. An estimated $39 billion will need to be invested in the effort to improve health systems and scale up capacity in the countries most affected.

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