Globe in Brief

Disaster effort targets schools, hospitals

With broad support from global health leaders, including the World Health Organization and the Pan American Health Organization, the United Nations has launched the global One Million Safe Schools and Hospitals Campaign.

The goal of the new campaign is to protect health and educational facilities during emergencies, as people in schools and hospitals are often at greatest risk from harm during disasters. For example, a tropical storm in September 2009 brought down 42 schools in metro Manila and an earthquake the same month in Sumatra damaged two private hospitals.

“This campaign is unique because it offers people from all walks of life the opportunity to protect their hospitals and schools and, in turn, save lives,” said Eric Laroche, MD, WHO assistant director-general for health action in crises. “Members of the public, governments, health workers and hospitals can find a way to actively support this initiative to make 1 million hospitals and schools safe from disasters.”

The initiative was launched in April as part of the U.N. International Strategy for Disaster Reduction’s 2010–2011 World Disaster Reduction Campaign. For more information, visit www.safe-schools-hospitals.net.

Diabetes a growing health threat in China

Diabetes has become a major public health problem in China, where more than 92 million adults have the disease and 148 million have pre-diabetes symptoms.

A study in the March 25 New England Journal of Medicine found almost 10 percent of China’s adults have diabetes. The incidence of pre-diabetes, which is defined as having impaired fasting glucose or glucose tolerance, affects 15.5 percent of the country’s adults. Diabetes prevalence increased with age and weight. More than 20 percent of adults ages 60 and older had diabetes, compared to about 3 percent of those ages 20–39. Diabetes was also higher among China’s urban than rural residents, at about 11 percent versus 8 percent.

“These results indicate that diabetes has become a major public health problem in China and that strategies aimed at the prevention and treatment of diabetes are needed,” the study’s authors wrote. “Given its large population, China may bear a higher diabetes-related burden than any other country.”

The majority of diabetes cases in China are undiagnosed, according to the study, underscoring the need for prevention, detection and treatment efforts.

Ontario universal flu vaccination a success

Ontario’s universal flu vaccine campaign, which offers free vaccinations to everyone, saves lives and is cost-effective, a recent study found.

The study, published April 6 in the Public Library of Science Medicine journal, found that while the estimated $40 million annual price tag of Ontario’s flu vaccination campaign is double the cost of a campaign targeted to specific populations, the universal campaign is still cost-effective.

“Compared to a targeted influenza immunization program, the universal program reduces influenza illness attack rates, morbidity and mortality at reasonable cost to the taxpayer,” said Beate Sander, a researcher at the University Health Network’s Division of Clinical Decision-Making and Health Care Research in Ontario. “Aside from saving lives and sparing people from suffering the flu, preventing influenza cases effectively reduced influenza-related health care costs by 52 percent and saved the health care system $7.8 million per season.”

Ontario launched its universal flu vaccination campaign in 2000, making free flu vaccination available to all residents. The study estimated the campaign prevents almost 35,000 flu cases each season and 111 deaths, as well as more than 30,000 flu-related doctor visits. Health care savings offset almost 40 percent of the vaccination program’s costs, according to the study.

Researchers noted that their study provides evidence for universal vaccine programs in “jurisdictions with influenza epidemiology and health care costs that are broadly similar to that of Ontario.”