‘Common Diseases Are Becoming Untreatable,’ Greater ‘Global Governance’ Necessary, According to April UN Report
by Jordan Hilger, Worthy News Correspondent
(Worthy News) – “Antimicrobial resistance is a global crisis that threatens a century of progress in health and achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals,” states the opening line of a UN Report to the Secretary-General published last month.
The report, which grows out of an agreement by all UN member states in 2015 to end poverty by 2030 and abide by 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), claims that overuse and misuse of antimicrobial drugs like antibiotics are contributing to the spread of drug-resistant pathogens such as N. gonorrhoeae, the bacteria that causes gonorrhea, and could lead to around 2 million deaths in developed countries over the next 50 years.
Besides the overuse of antibiotics, everything from “inadequate access to clean water” to “lack of equitable access to affordable and quality-assured antimicrobials” to poor “food safety and waste management systems” has led to the proliferation of common diseases that are developing immunities to conventional treatments, necessitating “a sustained One Health response,” according to the report.
“If we are going to develop successful strategies to reduce the impact and spread of antimicrobial resistance the scientists, clinicians, veterinarians, policymakers, and members of the community will have to work together to address the problem from a One Health perspective,” Melinda Pettitgrew, a professor of epidemiology at the Yale School of Public Health, reiterated to CNN, citing the new paradigm of global health management described by the website for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as “a collaborative, multisectoral, and transdisciplinary approach” that involves harnessing both the public and private sectors of a society to combat disease.
In addition to infectious disease control and prevention, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development lists as objectives “universal health coverage and access to quality healthcare,” “universal access to sexual and reproductive health-care services,” “sustainable patterns of production and consumption” in the private sector, “adaptation [of societies] to the adverse impacts of climate change,” “the systematic mainstreaming of a gender perspective,” and fostering a sense of “global citizenship.”
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