What Uniting to Combat Tropical Diseases Will Really Require

Excerpt from an article by Dr Unni KarunakaraInternational, President of MSF first published in The Huffington Post, UK

“MSF treats sleeping sickness and several other of the life-threatening diseases under discussion in London*, including Chagas disease and kala azar, and while we are glad that attention is being focused on them now, we are concerned that the conference is painting too simple a picture of how we can finally be rid once and for all of these diseases.

Continued and expanded drug donations from the pharmaceutical industry will be part of the solution to address some diseases under discussion and alleviate a great deal of human suffering. But that strategy will not meet the challenges of treating other, more challenging diseases like Chagas, kala azar or sleeping sickness. For these life-threatening diseases, drug distribution alone isn’t enough—we will need to invest strongly in national screening and treatment programs, as well as the development of new and better diagnostic tests and medicines.”

*–This is referring to a conference which happened in London Monday 30 January, to attempt to eliminate this disease by 2020 along with the elimination or control of nine other so-called neglected diseases.

Photo: CAR 2011 © Anna Surinyach (An MSF staff member tests a child for sleeping sickness)