PREAMBLE: For each issue of this blog, we search for topics which deserve wider dissemination and action. In this issue we feature the commentary of Max Ajl in Daily Climate News and Analysis. October 20, 2009 (reference below). The topic is critical to survival of our planet as we know it, and Ajl’s grasp of the issues is transparent. He cites conclusions from an October 2009 UN conference on desertification, which offers both warnings and potential solutions. For example, dryland populations are already some of the planet’s most vulnerable: about 90% of such populations are in developing countries, and infant mortality rates in dryland areas are among the highest. However, he appears optimistic that the process of desertification may be fixable: for example, in a northern province of Argentina, a team of soil experts worked with native plant species to restore the micro-region’s bio-diversity and soil quality through a slow, deliberate process of re-vegetation. The plants are still growing and the project is still on-going, and it appears that the process of degradation has been stopped, at least for the time being. Relevant to the global search for carbon capture methods, he notes that dry land soils are nowhere close to carbon saturated and may have enormous potential for carbon sequestration. He concludes by emphasizing the primary need to ensure that cultivation techniques are ecologically appropriate: to prevent desertification it before it starts.
Read on for more detail on these timely and constructive observations, which we have taken liberty to select and paraphrase, for further dissemination in the public interest:
Desertification Threatens Food Security and ClimateAccording to Max Ajl, one must keep in the mind the distinction between deserts as a specific ecosystem and desertification as a specific process: “deserts are beguiling and wondrous…; (but) desertification is the rapid, human-induced creation of deserts — the sudden, accelerated conversion of arid or semi-arid land, usually by over-grazing, deforestation, over-extraction of groundwater, drought, over-planting, or some nasty combination of the five. Desertification, we can hopefully stop and, if we catch it early, reverse at a reasonable cost — and in the process, do a good bit to stop climate change and global warming.” That, he notes, is the idea behind a recent congress on the United Nations Convention on Desertification, which wrapped up this month (October 2009) in Argentina. The Convention is an off-spring of the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), better known as the Rio Conference. Its executive secretary, Luc Gnacadja, warned that action is urgent: ‘If we cannot find a solution to this problem ... in 2025, close to 70 percent [of the planet’s soil] could be affected," Gnacadja said. "There will not be global security without food security.’ ”
Ajl summarizes the process of desertification: “When land covered with vegetation loses its vegetation, it heats up more rapidly, worsening climate change. Hotter soil leaks carbon into the atmosphere faster than non-overheated soil, thereby contributing to the world’s CO2 count. Furthermore, as vegetation is eaten up during over-grazing or destroyed, its root structure disappears. Massive amounts of plant-based carbon go directly into the atmosphere from the land, where it had formerly been securely stashed away. Furthermore, the humus that had been stored in the soil also migrates into the atmosphere, contributing to the overload of CO2 already there.” He continues: “Processes of desertification are world-wide and worsening. Even in 2000, nearly 40 percent of the world’s agricultural land was… seriously degraded, according to the World Resources Institute. In Central America, the figure was 70%; in Africa, 20%.... UN officials claim… that if current trends continue, 75% of the continent’s people will rely on some kind of food aid by 2025.”
“Dry-land — which can include forests but primarily means grasslands — is particularly susceptible to desertification. Dry-lands are 40 percent of the earth’s surface and technically refer to lands where the prevailing climate is classified as dry sub-humid, semi-arid, arid or hyper-arid. Although they have a lower per-meter amount of plant biomass, roughly 6 kg/m2, compared to other vegetation-covered ecosystems, which have between 10 and 18 kg/m2 of biomass, they are estimated to contain 27 percent of total global soil carbon. Many of these regions are also degraded, due to rampant over-grazing compounded by drought. As the United Nations Environment Program point out, such soils are not remotely close to being saturated with carbon and may have enormous potential for carbon sequestration. According to the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA), World Resources Institute, 10 to 20% of drylands are already degraded. Between 1 and 6% of the people living in drylands live in totally desertified areas."
He notes, “dryland populations are already some of the planet’s most vulnerable. About 90% of dryland populations are in developing countries, and infant mortality rates for countries dominated by drylands tower over the others. Likewise, gross national product is far lower for dryland-countries than for those countries with more diverse and moist bio-regions. Another issue is the over-use of intensive agriculture in places ecologically unsuited for it. As the MEA researchers note, ‘Transformation of rangelands and sylvo-pastoral dryland systems to croplands increases the risk of desertification.’ Such risks are worsened by the use of input-intensive and heavily mechanized cultivation practices, especially in lands that are utterly unsuited for such intensive agriculture.”
He continues: “A different source of degradation is the forced shift from grassland to shrub-land, as large-scale unsustainable ranching or pasturing practices increasingly prevail throughout the world (although properly-practiced ranching can increase the amount of carbon stores in soil). As grass-land transitions to shrub-land leads to more naked and exposed soil, accelerating run-off and heightening erosion. In savannas, the carbon flux into the atmosphere may be at least as large as that from deforestation.”
However, he appears optimistic that the process of desertification may be fixable, citing an Argentine example: in a northern province, Santiago del Estero, a team led by Italian soil expert Massimo Candelori reversed desertification in Colonia El Simbolar… the team worked with native plant species to restore the micro-region’s bio-diversity and soil quality through a slow, deliberate process of revegetation. The plants are still growing and the project on-going; it appears that the process of degradation has been stopped, at least for the time being.
More broadly, he states, “making sure cultivation techniques are ecologically appropriate, is the best weapon against desertification: preventing it before it starts…. Practices that contribute to soil degrading include removing crop residue for cheap fodder, fuel and fencing; removing top soil for making bricks; and using animal waste for household cooking rather than working it into the soil as natural fertilizer. These long-held practices can be changed through education.” He cites Rattan Lal, the world’s leading soil authority: "long-term sustainable management of soil must be given priority over the short-term gains." Ajl concludes: “Desertification is stoppable, if action begins now.”
Source: Max Ajl. Solve Climate. Daily Climate News and Analysis. October 20, 2009. http://solveclimate.com:80/blog/20091020/desertification-threatens-food-security-and-climate
Showing posts with label public health. Show all posts
Showing posts with label public health. Show all posts
Sunday, 15 November 2009
Thursday, 15 October 2009
DRAWING ATTENTION TO A GLOBAL PANDEMIC - Diarrhoeal Disease
PREAMBLE: Diarrhoea remains the second leading cause of death among children under five globally, surpassed only by pneumonia, the most common cause. Nearly one in five child deaths – about 1.5 million each year – is due to diarrhoea. It kills more young children than AIDS, malaria and measles combined.
PacificSci wishes to draw attention to a recently released joint report from UNICEF and WHO that addresses this perennial global pandemic. Diarrhoeal disease, no longer a scourge in developed countries, attracts comparatively little attention from the international donor community, when compared with conditions such as HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria. And today, the media spotlight has shifted to H1N1 influenza, with little sense of proportionality in terms of continuing real disease burdens globally.
Acknowledgement: The material used in this edition of Global Perspectives is drawn almost verbatim from the Executive Summary of the joint UNICEF/WHO report, as referenced below.
THE REPORT:
In 2006, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Health Organization (WHO) issued a report highlighting the most common cause of death among children (Pneumonia: The Forgotten Killer of Children). The purpose was to raise the profile of that neglected disease. This new report is written with the same intent – to focus attention on the prevention and management of diarrhoeal diseases as central to improving child survival. Together, pneumonia and diarrhoea are responsible for an estimated 40 per cent of all child deaths around the world each year.
There are lessons to be learned from past experience. An international commitment to tackle childhood diarrhoea in the 1970s and 1980s resulted in a major reduction in child deaths. This came about largely through the scaling up of oral rehydration therapy, coupled with programmes to educate caregivers on its appropriate use. But these efforts lost momentum as the world turned its attention to other global emergencies. Today, only 39 per cent of children with diarrhoea in developing countries receive the recommended treatment, and limited trend data suggest that there has been little progress since 2000.
This report examines the latest available information on the burden and distribution of childhood diarrhoea. It also analyses how well countries are doing in making available key interventions proven to reduce its toll. Most importantly, it lays out a new strategy for diarrhoea control, one that is based on interventions drawn from different sectors that have demonstrated potential to save children’s lives. It sets out a 7-point plan that includes a treatment package to reduce childhood diarrhoea deaths, as well as a prevention package to make a lasting reduction in the diarrhoea burden in the medium to long term.
New aspects of this approach include vaccinations for rotavirus, which is estimated to cause about 40 per cent of hospital admissions due to diarrhea among children under five worldwide.3 In terms of community-wide sanitation, new approaches to increase demand to stop open defecation have proven more effective than previous strategies. It has been estimated that 88 per cent of diarrhoeal deaths worldwide are attributable to unsafe water, inadequate sanitation and poor hygiene.
Actions needed to take interventions to scale
In many countries, progress has been made in the delivery or promotion of several of these interventions, particularly vitamin A supplementation and exclusive breastfeeding. However, a substantial reduction in the diarrhoea burden will require greater emphasis on the following actions:
■ Ensure wide availability of low-osmolarity ORS and zinc, which could have a profound impact on child deaths from diarrhoea if scaled up immediately. Possible strategies to increase their uptake and availability could include the development of smaller ORS packets and flavoured formulas, as well as delivering zinc and low-osmolarity ORS together in diarrhoea treatment kits.
■ Include rotavirus vaccine in national immunization programmes worldwide, which was recently recommended by the World Health Organization.
A 7-point plan for comprehensive diarrhoea control is outlined immediately below: two (#1 and #2) elements are contained with a treatment package”, while five (#3 to #7) are contained within a prevention package.
Treatment Package
The treatment package focuses on two main elements, as outlined in a 2004 joint statement from UNICEF and WHO: 1) fluid replacement to prevent dehydration and 2) zinc treatment. Oral rehydration therapy – which has been heralded as one of the most important medical advances of the 20th century – is the cornerstone of fluid replacement.
New aspects of this approach include low-osmolarity oral rehydration salts (ORS), which are more effective at replacing fluids than the original ORS formulation, and zinc treatment, which decreases diarrhea severity and duration. Important additional components of the package are continued feeding, including breastfeeding, during diarrhoea episodes and the use of appropriate fluids available in the home if ORS are not available, along with increased fluids in general.
Prevention Package
The prevention package highlights five main elements that require a concerted approach in their implementation. The package includes: 3) rotavirus and measles vaccinations, 4) promotion of early and exclusive breastfeeding and vitamin A supplementation, 5) promotion of handwashing with soap, 6) improved water supply quantity and quality, including treatment and safe storage of household water, and 7) community-wide sanitation promotion.
Key strategic elements include:■ Develop and implement behaviour change interventions, such as face-to-face counselling, to encourage exclusive breastfeeding.
■ Ensure sustained high levels of vitamin A supplementation, such as by combining its delivery, where effective, with other high-impact health and nutrition interventions.
■ Apply results of existing consumer research on how to motivate people to wash their hands with soap to increase this beneficial and cost-effective health practice. Handwashing with soap has been shown to reduce the incidence of diarrhoeal disease by over 40 per cent.
■ Adopt household water treatment and safe storage systems, such as chlorination and
filtration, in both development and emergency situations to support reductions in the number of diarrhoea cases.
■ Implement approaches that increase demand to stop community-wide open defecation. As with handwashing, the new approach employs behavioural triggers, such as pride, shame and disgust, to motivate action, and leads to greater ownership and sustainability of programmes.
The report states: “We know what works to immediately reduce deaths from childhood diarrhoea. We also know what actions will make a lasting contribution to reducing the toll of diarrhoeal diseases for years to come. But strengthened efforts on both fronts must begin right away.”
The following actions are needed to take the 7-point plan to scale:
■ Mobilize and allocate resources for diarrhea control.
■ Reinstate diarrhoea prevention and treatment as a cornerstone of community-based primary health care.
■ Ensure that low-osmolarity ORS and zinc are adopted as policy in all countries.
■ Reach every child with effective interventions.
■ Accelerate the provision of basic water and sanitation services.
■ Use innovative strategies to increase the adoption of proven measures against diarrhoea.
■ Change behaviours through community involvement, education and health-promotion activities.
■ Make health systems work to control diarrhoea.
■ Monitor progress at all levels, and make the results count.
■ Make the prevention and treatment of diarrhea everybody’s business.
The Executive Summary to the report concludes with the statement that "There is no better time than now. Political momentum is building to address the leading causes of child deaths, including pneumonia and diarrhoea, to achieve measurable gains in child survival. The year 2008 marked the 30th anniversary of the Alma- Ata Declaration, with reinvigorated calls to focus on primary health care. Lessening the burden of childhood diarrhoea fits squarely with this emphasis, and is essential for achieving Millennium Development Goal 4: reduce child mortality, whose target date is now only six years away."
SOURCE: Executive Summary. Diarrhoea :Why children are still dying and what can be done. The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF)/World Health Organization (WHO), 2009. http://whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/2009/9789241598415_eng.pdf
PacificSci wishes to draw attention to a recently released joint report from UNICEF and WHO that addresses this perennial global pandemic. Diarrhoeal disease, no longer a scourge in developed countries, attracts comparatively little attention from the international donor community, when compared with conditions such as HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria. And today, the media spotlight has shifted to H1N1 influenza, with little sense of proportionality in terms of continuing real disease burdens globally.
Acknowledgement: The material used in this edition of Global Perspectives is drawn almost verbatim from the Executive Summary of the joint UNICEF/WHO report, as referenced below.
THE REPORT:
In 2006, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Health Organization (WHO) issued a report highlighting the most common cause of death among children (Pneumonia: The Forgotten Killer of Children). The purpose was to raise the profile of that neglected disease. This new report is written with the same intent – to focus attention on the prevention and management of diarrhoeal diseases as central to improving child survival. Together, pneumonia and diarrhoea are responsible for an estimated 40 per cent of all child deaths around the world each year.
There are lessons to be learned from past experience. An international commitment to tackle childhood diarrhoea in the 1970s and 1980s resulted in a major reduction in child deaths. This came about largely through the scaling up of oral rehydration therapy, coupled with programmes to educate caregivers on its appropriate use. But these efforts lost momentum as the world turned its attention to other global emergencies. Today, only 39 per cent of children with diarrhoea in developing countries receive the recommended treatment, and limited trend data suggest that there has been little progress since 2000.
This report examines the latest available information on the burden and distribution of childhood diarrhoea. It also analyses how well countries are doing in making available key interventions proven to reduce its toll. Most importantly, it lays out a new strategy for diarrhoea control, one that is based on interventions drawn from different sectors that have demonstrated potential to save children’s lives. It sets out a 7-point plan that includes a treatment package to reduce childhood diarrhoea deaths, as well as a prevention package to make a lasting reduction in the diarrhoea burden in the medium to long term.
New aspects of this approach include vaccinations for rotavirus, which is estimated to cause about 40 per cent of hospital admissions due to diarrhea among children under five worldwide.3 In terms of community-wide sanitation, new approaches to increase demand to stop open defecation have proven more effective than previous strategies. It has been estimated that 88 per cent of diarrhoeal deaths worldwide are attributable to unsafe water, inadequate sanitation and poor hygiene.
Actions needed to take interventions to scale
In many countries, progress has been made in the delivery or promotion of several of these interventions, particularly vitamin A supplementation and exclusive breastfeeding. However, a substantial reduction in the diarrhoea burden will require greater emphasis on the following actions:
■ Ensure wide availability of low-osmolarity ORS and zinc, which could have a profound impact on child deaths from diarrhoea if scaled up immediately. Possible strategies to increase their uptake and availability could include the development of smaller ORS packets and flavoured formulas, as well as delivering zinc and low-osmolarity ORS together in diarrhoea treatment kits.
■ Include rotavirus vaccine in national immunization programmes worldwide, which was recently recommended by the World Health Organization.
A 7-point plan for comprehensive diarrhoea control is outlined immediately below: two (#1 and #2) elements are contained with a treatment package”, while five (#3 to #7) are contained within a prevention package.
Treatment Package
The treatment package focuses on two main elements, as outlined in a 2004 joint statement from UNICEF and WHO: 1) fluid replacement to prevent dehydration and 2) zinc treatment. Oral rehydration therapy – which has been heralded as one of the most important medical advances of the 20th century – is the cornerstone of fluid replacement.
New aspects of this approach include low-osmolarity oral rehydration salts (ORS), which are more effective at replacing fluids than the original ORS formulation, and zinc treatment, which decreases diarrhea severity and duration. Important additional components of the package are continued feeding, including breastfeeding, during diarrhoea episodes and the use of appropriate fluids available in the home if ORS are not available, along with increased fluids in general.
Prevention Package
The prevention package highlights five main elements that require a concerted approach in their implementation. The package includes: 3) rotavirus and measles vaccinations, 4) promotion of early and exclusive breastfeeding and vitamin A supplementation, 5) promotion of handwashing with soap, 6) improved water supply quantity and quality, including treatment and safe storage of household water, and 7) community-wide sanitation promotion.
Key strategic elements include:■ Develop and implement behaviour change interventions, such as face-to-face counselling, to encourage exclusive breastfeeding.
■ Ensure sustained high levels of vitamin A supplementation, such as by combining its delivery, where effective, with other high-impact health and nutrition interventions.
■ Apply results of existing consumer research on how to motivate people to wash their hands with soap to increase this beneficial and cost-effective health practice. Handwashing with soap has been shown to reduce the incidence of diarrhoeal disease by over 40 per cent.
■ Adopt household water treatment and safe storage systems, such as chlorination and
filtration, in both development and emergency situations to support reductions in the number of diarrhoea cases.
■ Implement approaches that increase demand to stop community-wide open defecation. As with handwashing, the new approach employs behavioural triggers, such as pride, shame and disgust, to motivate action, and leads to greater ownership and sustainability of programmes.
The report states: “We know what works to immediately reduce deaths from childhood diarrhoea. We also know what actions will make a lasting contribution to reducing the toll of diarrhoeal diseases for years to come. But strengthened efforts on both fronts must begin right away.”
The following actions are needed to take the 7-point plan to scale:
■ Mobilize and allocate resources for diarrhea control.
■ Reinstate diarrhoea prevention and treatment as a cornerstone of community-based primary health care.
■ Ensure that low-osmolarity ORS and zinc are adopted as policy in all countries.
■ Reach every child with effective interventions.
■ Accelerate the provision of basic water and sanitation services.
■ Use innovative strategies to increase the adoption of proven measures against diarrhoea.
■ Change behaviours through community involvement, education and health-promotion activities.
■ Make health systems work to control diarrhoea.
■ Monitor progress at all levels, and make the results count.
■ Make the prevention and treatment of diarrhea everybody’s business.
The Executive Summary to the report concludes with the statement that "There is no better time than now. Political momentum is building to address the leading causes of child deaths, including pneumonia and diarrhoea, to achieve measurable gains in child survival. The year 2008 marked the 30th anniversary of the Alma- Ata Declaration, with reinvigorated calls to focus on primary health care. Lessening the burden of childhood diarrhoea fits squarely with this emphasis, and is essential for achieving Millennium Development Goal 4: reduce child mortality, whose target date is now only six years away."
SOURCE: Executive Summary. Diarrhoea :Why children are still dying and what can be done. The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF)/World Health Organization (WHO), 2009. http://whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/2009/9789241598415_eng.pdf
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