Corona is lacking measures against other diseases

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Paris â Wenn ’When the member countries of the World Health Organization (WHO) hold their virtual annual meeting next Monday, the fight against the corona pandemic will outshine everything else.

In doing so, other, already known infectious diseases kill millions of people every year – especially in developing countries. Experts warn that these deaths will increase significantly as the corona pandemic treats treatment and vaccination against diseases such as measles and AIDS.

Everything is focused on fighting COVID-19, says Robin Nandy, director of the UN Children’s Fund’s Unicef ​​vaccination program. Health systems are so burdened that routine care has been suspended in some places. In order to avoid contagion, health personnel should have as little contact with patients as possible and should therefore no longer vaccinate.

According to Unicef, 37 countries have interrupted their vaccination campaigns. 117 million children could therefore develop measles. A childhood disease that can end fatally in areas with poor health care. Even before the pandemic, more than 2,500 children died of bacterial pneumonia every day. If treated, studies have shown that over 800,000 child deaths can be prevented each year.

In Nigeria, pneumonia is the main cause of death in young children and it is feared that the corona pandemic will cause even more deaths from it. Many children come with breathing difficulties, but both diagnosis and treatment are problematic for us, says Sanjana Bhardwaj, Unicef ​​health director in Nigeria.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo suffered from several epidemics before COVID-19. Since the measles outbreak began last year, 6,000 people have died there. There are also around 13,000 malaria deaths each year. At least the Ebola epidemic seemed overcome, but new cases were reported in April. COVID-19 has exacerbated the dangers that have always existed, says Alex Mutanganyi of the aid organization Save The Children.

The treatment of tuberculosis (TBC) is also made difficult by the corona pandemic. The Initiative TB fears that up to 1.4 million people could die from it worldwide. With around ten million new infections and 1.5 million deaths per year, tuberculosis is the world’s deadliest infectious disease.

However, significantly less money is invested in TBC research than HIV or COVID-19. The only current TBC vaccine is more than 100 years old and only works in very young children.

The development of a safe and universal vaccine would cost about $ 500 million, said Stop TB’s Lucica Ditiu. For comparison: Billions of dollars are being invested in the search for a vaccine against COVID-19; around 70 possible vaccines are already being tested on humans.

We are amazed to see that 100 vaccine candidates are already in the pipeline for a 120-day-old illness, Ditiu said. She explains the imbalance in research funding as follows: Tuberculosis is a disease of the poor.

In many countries, chronically ill people also have disadvantages due to corona control. Hundreds of millions of people need medication every day, for example against diabetes or high blood pressure. The alliance against non-communicable diseases called on governments at the end of April to ensure that those affected were treated despite the pandemic, especially since these diseases can lead to complications from SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Health problems in the pandemic medication also threaten HIV-infected people in sub-Saharan Africa, the WHO warned. If the supply chain for antiretroviral drugs should remain interrupted for half a year, the number of AIDS deaths could double. ©afp / aerzteblatt.de

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