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Call
for a Middle East Center of Disease
Prevention
Author:
Dr
Safaa BahjatSafaa
A Middle
East Centre of Disease Prevention and
control which deals only with communicable
disease - is it a dream that is hard
to become true? Is it like getting into
a hot water?
The proposed
Centre will not replace the public health
institutions in member states of the
Middle East. Instead it will act as
a coordination resource and support
centre on which these countries can
call. Among the tasks for this center
will be harmonization of surveillance
methodologies across the Middle East
providing scientific opinions and technical
assistance supporting preparedness,
planning for health emergencies and
will provide a rapid response to health
threats. Since the 1950's, Arabs have
made little progress in health related
areas for several reasons; the Arab
Israeli conflict, the catastrophic health
and economic sanctions in Palestine,
the embargos on Iraq and the major wars
which have erupted in the past few decades,
mainly in Lebanon (1975-1991), Kuwait
1990, and Iraq 1980-1988, 1991 and 2003.
Military spending by Arabs amounts to
about US 60 billion dollars of which
only 0.9 billion is allocated to research
and development. 1
Oman, Saudi
Arabia and Kuwait spent more than 10%
of their gross domestic Product GPD
on defense. Iran spent more than 5%
of their GDP on defense, than on health
at 4%. Historical population and GDP
data were obtained from the US Census
Bureau (http://www..census.gov/ips/www/idbacc.html)and
EconStat (http://econstat .com) respectively.
The stand
off between Iran and the security council
about it's nuclear program has an alarming
extra twist. It will have a detrimental
effect on the output of scientific research
and endanger more the instability of
the region. From a public health prospective,
avoidance of violent conflicts is the
key objective in international relations.
Are there any ways of analyzing such
stand-offs, which might suggest ways
to resolve them. Commentators have noted
similarities between this conflict and
that of the USA and the USSR during
the cold war, in which game theory was
first used to analyze and attempt to
predict the behavior of the participants.
One such a game is "chicken" when two
participants engage into a competition,
say a head-on car race, which is bound
to end in a disaster unless one swerves.
To outsiders the game seems insane but
to the participants in whom many complex
principles of prestige, honour, territory
security and so on are at stake, it
can feel as if they have no choice but
to take part. International diplomacy
is the art of persuading one or both
to swerve with out loss of face. Sometimes
this is done by introducing a new factor
into the game, which both participants
can agree on and use as a way out of
direct confrontation.
Are there
any diversions that might be used to
draw the attention of the participants
away from the conflict? One might be
reassessment of how such games affect
the country's economy. So instead of
military spending which is draining
resources, governments can invest in
civil health.
One of the
urgent questions is are we prepared
for the next pandemic of influenza?
As we began the new century did we launch
arrangements carefully and thoughtfully
in order not to be overwhelmed in the
first wave of global infection, while
there is still time? There is a window
of opportunity open now that will gradually
close over the coming months. Remember,
the 2 pandemics in 1917 and 1968 the
causalities numbered 6 million world
wide and the virology community did
very little except to observe and record.
The coming influenza pandemic will cut
huge swathes in the world's community
and history will look with jaundiced
eyes, should governments hesitate?
The SARS
outbreak of 2003 awakened a new aggressive
spirit underpinned with molecular science
and rapid diagnosis .We would no longer
wish to be the audience at macabre theatres
of infection, rather, infectious disease
experts, mathematicians, virologists
,vaccine specialist's and chemotherapists
would be thrown into the fray. The world
was lucky with SARS.
In the living
memory is the capricious mother nature
.The Bam earthquake and the tsunami
tragedy in Asia cruelly exposed the
citizens of this area to the mercy of
nature through lack of planning and
scientific planning. The earthquake
in South Asia is another example. We
should seize the opportunity of the
economic boom, achieved by the huge
rise in the oil prices which afford
a good chance for the countries of the
Middle East to improve the public health
infrastructure of the region.
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