Investing to control infectious diseases for future generations

Be it the Ebola epidemic in 2013 or the Zika outbreak in 2015 or more recently the coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic, infectious diseases are on the rise. The World Health Organization (WHO) states that infectious diseases kill more than 17 million people a year. 22 new diseases have emerged in the last 30 years. According to the vital signs report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), illnesses from mosquito, tick and flea bites have tripled during the 13 years from 2004 through 2016. What can be done to prevent and manage the infectious diseases? Let’s find out.

- Ayesha Siddiqui

Infectious diseases were responsible for the largest global burden of premature death and disability until the end of the twentieth century, when that distinction passed to noncommunicable diseases. Over the previous centuries, global pandemics of infectious diseases, such as smallpox, cholera, and influenza, periodically threatened the survival of entire populations. At least as early as the late 1800s, improved living conditions (such as better sanitation and piped water supplies), particularly in high-income countries (HICs), began to drive down the infectious disease burden.

By the mid-twentieth century, safe, effective, and affordable vaccines and the increasing availability of antibiotics had further reduced the toll of infectious diseases in HICs. Not until the second half of the twentieth century did largescale efforts begin to better control infectious diseases in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), where the infectious disease burden was greatest and highly varied. These efforts included a global commitment to immunize the world’s children against the major infections for which vaccines are available and global campaigns to control malaria and diarrheal disease. The International Health Regulations of the World Health Organization (WHO) represent a key agreement among 196 countries to implement metrics and measures to detect and control outbreaks of infectious diseases and to prevent pandemics (World Health Assembly 2005).