Episode #134 – Disease be gone!

VSG Countries are eliminating diseases all over the world. In fact, in the last five years alone, forty-four eliminations have been confirmed by WHO. There’s one disease that because of the global effort, no one can get anymore. Do you know which one it is? If yes, please write it down in the comments and we’ll talk about it in this episode. We’re talking about disease elimination today. What does it take to eliminate a disease on the ground? And what needs to happen before WHO can confirm a disease that a disease has been eliminated? We’re talking to Dr Jérôme Salomon Welcome, Jérôme. Jérôme, what are these diseases that have been eliminated in the past five years?

JS So, many diseases, like tropical diseases have already been eliminated. Fifty countries, for example, have already eliminated at least one Neglected Tropical Disease. So that’s a huge success because it’s a very heavy burden for the populations. Malaria, forty-five countries have already eliminated malaria, thanks to all the tools that are available. Vector controls, insecticides, bed nets, chemical prophylaxis treatment, and now we have two vaccines to protect children. Important point, we want to protect, for example, pregnant women who can transmit infections to their babies, of HIV, hepatitis B, syphilis. We are working with many countries to eliminate this vertical transmission of very important diseases. And something that, maybe, a lot of women don’t know, we can prevent cervical cancer thanks to vaccination. You know, we have a lot of examples and we are very, very hopeful that we will eliminate thirty two diseases in the next decade.

VGS So what needs to happen on the ground for a disease to be eliminated and for WHO to confirm that it has indeed been eliminated?

JS When we say ‘elimination’ it’s eliminating a disease as a public health problem, as a public health concern in a region or in a country. It’s a huge work because we need a strong political commitment, coming from the head of state and ministries of course. WHO is helping a lot in terms of technical assistance and guidance. We are working together with education department, with agriculture department, with environment, because it’s global health, it’s a one health approach. And then the local level is the most important one because we need to have the villages, the chiefs of the villages, the communities, involved and engaged. We also need NGO’s, we need the strong voices of people with lived experience. We need the young people to also be very committed to explain, to share their experiences, to adapt the tools to all the populations because we need to work without any stigma, without any discriminations and we need all the populations to be fully engaged. We have a very important report to WHO and then WHO can certify. Take a very concrete example, the polio eradication campaign. We need all the populations to be vaccinated. So it’s very important because we are very close to eradication of polio. We have to keep in mind, that the efforts should be strong and we never stop surveillance and having in mind that the virus could be back.

VGS So when we eliminate polio, does that mean it will be like smallpox, gone forever?

JS So it’s important to remember that smallpox is the only human disease that has been eradicated? It was in 1980, so it was forty-five years ago and we are still trying to eradicate a second disease, maybe Guinea worm or polio.

VSG Jérôme, what can individuals and communities do to support disease elimination?

JS They can do a lot. Sometimes we could say, well, neglected tropical diseases or some of these diseases are not concerning because I am very far away. I’m a thousand kilometers away. I’m living in a rich country, that is not affected. Which is the wrong idea, because it’s like a fire. You could say, well the fire is far away from my house, I don’t need to call the fireman. But, in fact, you could wait and then the fire will affect your house. So having this global behaviour, meaning we are all committed, we are all affected. I think, even individuals in rich countries could really convince their governments that we need global health architecture, that we need a global health surveillance and we need a global commitment to fight communicable disease and tropical disease. You can be strong ambassadors of public health, sharing messages, teaching people, reaching the unreachable, of your communities. We are living on a very small planet, it’s a small village, we all have a role to play.

VS Thank you, Jérôme. That was Science in 5 today. Until next time then, stay safe, stay healthy and stick with science.