World Pneumonia Day is celebrated on 12th November every year. It creates awareness about the harmful effects of pneumonia among the public. Its major objective is to reduce the global burden of pneumonia.
- World Pneumonia Day is celebrated annually on 12th November
- It generates awareness about the life-threatening consequences of pneumonia
- Its primary aim is to reduce under-5 mortality
The global celebrations are spearheaded by the Global Coalition Against Child Pneumonia, which includes more than 140 non-governmental organizations (NGOs), government agencies, civil society organizations, academic institutions, and foundations. Some of the key players include Save the Children, PneumoADIP, the Global Heath Council, the GAVI Alliance, and the Sabin Vaccine Institute.
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Objectives of World Pneumonia Day
The major objective of World Pneumonia Day is to raise awareness about pneumonia. It provides a unique opportunity to focus on the public health challenges faced during the implementation of vaccination programs, as well as inequities in access to healthcare. It is an ideal platform that involves all stakeholders – healthcare professionals, governments, policymakers, funding agencies, advocacy groups, patient organizations, and civil society at large – to expedite access to essential medical interventions for preventing and treating pneumonia in order to reduce the global disease burden.Pneumonia: Key Aspects
Pneumonia is a lung infection caused by bacteria and viruses and is one of the leading causes of death in children under the age of 5 years. Streptococcus pneumoniae and Haemophilus influenzae Type B (Hib) are the most common bacteria associated with pneumonia in children. Common symptoms include cough, difficulty in breathing, fever, and chest pain. Severe symptoms include rapid breathing, severe chest pain, confusion, and disorientation.Children living in poor communities are at the highest risk of acquiring pneumonia, which can be minimized in the following ways:
- Reducing indoor air pollution
- Avoiding exposure to cigarette smoke
- Practicing hand hygiene using soap and water
- Ensuring safe drinking water
- Increasing access to proper sanitation
- Exclusive breastfeeding for the first 6 months of life
- Adequate nutrition
- Zinc supplementation
- Vaccination with the Hib vaccine and pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV)
Pneumonia: Facts & Figures
- Pneumonia is the world’s leading infectious killer of children below the age of 5 years
- 155 million children under 5 years of age fall ill due to pneumonia every year
- 1.6 million children die from pneumonia every year
- 2 children die from pneumonia every minute
- Pneumonia kills more children than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined
- 99 percent of childhood pneumonia deaths occur in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs)
- 170 million children in LMICs are not vaccinated against pneumonia
- 35 percent of children worldwide receive the required three doses of PCV
- 47 million children are protected against pneumonia by vaccination with PCV
- 40 million episodes of pneumonia go untreated every year
- 11 million children under 5 could die from pneumonia by 2030
- 1.7 million Indian children could die from pneumonia by 2030
- 158,176 pneumonia deaths occurred in India in 2016
Ways to Celebrate World Pneumonia Day
There are numerous ways to celebrate World Pneumonia Day in order to raise awareness. A few of these are briefly highlighted below:- Popular Talks
- Free Respiratory Check-ups
- Social Media Campaigns
- Fundraising Sporting Events
- Voluntarily offering medical or educational services
Global Strategies for Tackling Pneumonia
- Global Action Plan for Prevention and Control of Pneumonia (GAPP): This Global Action Plan, jointly developed by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), indicates that the lives of over 1 million children could be saved every year if adequate prevention and treatment interventions were implemented in the world’s poorest countries
- Sustainable Development Goals (SDG): The SDGs were developed in 2015 with the aim of achieving a new, well-defined set of global targets by 2030. SDG 3 aims to “Ensure healthy lives and promote wellbeing for all at all ages”. Within SDG 3, Target 3.2 aims to end preventable deaths of newborns and children under 5 years of age, with all countries aiming to reduce neonatal mortality to at least 12 per 1000 live births and under-5 mortality to at least 25 per 1000 live births by 2030
- Stop Pneumonia Initiative: This initiative is spearheaded by the International Vaccine Access Center (IVAC), which is located at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, Maryland, USA. The Stop Pneumonia Initiative provides support and lends a voice to underprivileged communities who lack access to proper healthcare facilities and life-saving vaccines for fighting pneumonia
Conclusion
Although great strides have been made in pneumonia prevention over the decades, still more needs to be done to reduce the disease burden further. So, on World Pneumonia Day, let’s pool our resources together to fight this deadly disease that kills over a million poor, innocent children every year across the globe.References:
- Pneumonia: The Forgotten Killer of Children - (https://www.unicef.org/publications/files/Pneumonia_The_Forgotten_Killer_of_Children.pdf)
- Child Survival and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) - (https://data.unicef.org/topic/child-survival/child-survival-sdgs/)
- The Stop Pneumonia Initiative - (https://stoppneumonia.org/)
- Pneumonia Fact Sheet - (https://www.thoracic.org/about/global-public-health/firs/resources/world-pneumonia-day-2018-factsheet.pdf)
Source-Medindia