Global Health in 2019: A Quick Recap

Year 2019 has been a time with pronounced divergence: big advances and big setbacks in global health. Here is the list of the good, the bad, and the ugly of 2019 reported by Dr.Tom Frieden, former director of the U.S. CDC, and former commissioner of the New York City Health Department.

Heart health improved in several parts of the world, but in the U.S., the decline in heart disease deaths stalled, contributing to a shocking deterioration in life expectancy. Epidemic preparedness awareness has been increased, but preventable infectious disease outbreaks continue. Many countries are decreasing smoking, but e-cigarettes are hooking a new generation of youngsters into lifelong nicotine addiction.

‘Instead of sliding backward, act strategically and urgently, implement what works and make the next decade the healthiest in human history.’

The good

• Industrially produced transfat kills 500,000 people each year, but this year, the European Union, Brazil, and Thailand banned it, bringing to nearly three billion people who will be protected from it.
• Many countries taxed on sugar-sweetened beverages to decrease obesity.
• Countries like China, Bangladesh, Vietnam, India, and countries throughout America are promoting care for people with hypertension, which kills nearly 10 million people every year.
• The WHO added combinations of two anti-hypertensive drugs in one pill to its essential drug list, which will improve access, decrease costs, and enhance treatment quality.

The bad

• The world is yet not ready for epidemic disease. Ebola has killed over 2,000 people in the DRC, and the epidemic is not over.
• Measles kills more than 100,000 children each year, and cases increased 17 percent due to underperformance of vaccination systems.
• The decline in malaria death slowed. Hence, new strategies are required to reduce deaths.
• After five decades of declines in stroke and heart attack and deaths in the U.S., progress has stalled.
• Overdoses are urging the tragic and continuing fall in life expectancy in the U.S.

The ugly

• E-cigarette use in U.S. teens skyrocketed 78 percent last year.
• The Ebola outbreak in the DRC put a spotlight on violence against health workers.
• The world continued to fail to take adequate action on climate change.

Source: Medindia