Coronavirus pandemic threatens the lives of at least one million people at risk of AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria
Couple Bryan Dyne
July 8, 2020
Estimates by the United Nations, the International AIDS Society, the Stop TB Partnership and Imperial College London, disruption in the supply chain caused by the coronavirus pandemic could cause at least one million people. additional deaths from AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, as resources traditionally used to control these diseases are diverted to combat epidemics of COVID-19.
The majority of these deaths are likely to occur in Africa, where there have been more than 481,000 cases and at least 11,400 deaths caused by the coronavirus. Countries like South Africa, Egypt, Nigeria, Ghana and Algeria have been particularly affected. Although the total number of cases and deaths is currently lower than that of other regions of the world, including the United States, India and Brazil, the World Health Organization (WHO) has warned repeatedly against the dangers of the pandemic in Africa, which has some of the least developed healthcare infrastructure in the world.
At the same time, the virus takes its toll among the nurses, doctors and other medical workers who are trying to fight and contain the pandemic. This situation has also resulted in institutions such as Medecins sans Frontieres, which in the past have provided resources to fight HIV / AIDS, being forced to focus on the treatment of patients with COVID-19.
[image]Man holds 10-month-old daughter with polio (Pakistan), May 6, 2020 (Source: AP Photo / Muhammad Sajjad) – https://www.wsws.org/asset/6baa9aca-59ff-4414-b1fb- daef34f5183P / image.jpg? rendition = image480[/image]
The impending crisis was highlighted by Dr Anton Pozniak, President of the International AIDS Society. He told CNN, “Social distancing efforts and containment measures to control the spread [du coronavirus] disrupted HIV prevention and treatment programs and put vital HIV research on hold. ”
His comments were underscored by the publication of the United Nations report “Global AIDS Update 2020”, which paints a disastrous picture of the progress made in years to end the HIV / AIDS pandemic. His models show that if medical supplies for AIDS are cut off for six months, there will be between 471,000 and 673,000 more AIDS-related deaths in sub-Saharan Africa alone by the end of 2021.
The report also summarizes the state of the fight against this pandemic over the past ten years. There are currently 38 million people living with HIV worldwide, but only 25.4 million are currently receiving some form of treatment, a deficit of 12.6 million people. At the same time, there was a 23% reduction in new HIV infections between 2010 and 2019, mainly in eastern and southern Africa. At the same time, there has been an increase in infections elsewhere in the world, including a 72% increase in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, a 22% increase in the Middle East and North Africa and an increase of 21 % in Latin America.
In total, there were 690,000 AIDS-related deaths in 2019, as well as 1.7 million new infections worldwide. The United Nations models had estimated that 2020 would have been the first year in which the number of AIDS-related deaths fell below 500,000 to 470,000. Instead, the escalating coronavirus pandemic threatens to reduce HIV control by at least 12 years.
WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at the opening of the 23rd International AIDS Conference on Monday that “a new WHO survey has shown that access to anti-HIV drugs HIV has been significantly reduced due to the pandemic. Seventy-three countries have indicated that they are at risk of running out of antiretroviral drugs (ARVs). ” ARVs are one of the main ways to treat HIV. They should be taken regularly to keep patients healthy and prevent the spread of the virus.
“The results of this investigation are very worrying,” concluded Dr. Tedros.
A similar report from Imperial College London shows that epidemics of malaria in the same region, sub-Saharan Africa, could spread without control following the coronavirus pandemic, causing at least 380,000 more deaths than expected.
Malaria is caused by a parasite mainly transmitted by mosquito bites, which introduces the disease of the mosquito’s saliva into the victim’s blood. Its symptoms are fever, fatigue, vomiting, headache, seizures, coma and death. In 2018, 228 million infections were reported worldwide, resulting in 405,000 deaths. The disease is more common in Africa, Asia and Central and South America.
Although it is fatal, the most effective way to control the spread of malaria is to distribute insecticide-treated nets. They cost around $ 2 each, last up to four years, and protect an average of two people each. However, as the pandemic continues to grow exponentially in regions already hard hit by malaria, the supply chains for new nets are likely to collapse. This could double the number of deaths expected from malaria.
It should also be noted that the article by Imperial College provides that in a scenario where the coronavirus is not contained or that the eradication measures are lifted – current situation in the United States, Brazil, India, in South Africa and other countries – the final toll of the pandemic itself will be around 3.3 million dead.
The coronavirus pandemic has also exacerbated the risk of contracting and dying of tuberculosis. The Stop TB Partnership recently released findings showing that while there is some form of containment and recovery to stop the coronavirus, there could still be 6.3 million infections and 1.4 million deaths. due to tuberculosis. To quote the report, “the global incidence of tuberculosis and the number of deaths in 2021 would increase to reach the last levels observed respectively between 2013 and 2016 – which implies a decline of at least 5 to 8 years in the fight against tuberculosis, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. ”
Tuberculosis is currently the leading cause of death from an infectious disease on the planet and is one of the deadliest bacteria in history. There were around 10 million active cases worldwide in 2018, and almost one in four people is suspected of having latent TB infection. Although it is manageable by antibiotics, it is estimated that it still kills 1.5 million people each year. The pathogen is also one of the most resistant to drug treatments.
Having TB also increases the risk of dying from COVID-19. In India, which currently has 720,000 cases of coronavirus and more than 20,000 confirmed deaths, there are approximately 7,370 new cases of tuberculosis and 1,230 new deaths caused by the disease every day. This represents approximately 2.7 million new cases of tuberculosis and just under 450,000 new deaths each year. The combination of these two diseases could cause a health catastrophe of epic proportions in the country and the region.
These dangers also exist in large parts of Africa. Nigeria and South Africa have the second and fourth highest death rates from tuberculosis worldwide, respectively, and the fourth and second highest death rates from COVID-19 in Africa, respectively. Indonesia, which has the third highest death rate in the world for tuberculosis, is one of the countries most affected by the pandemic in Southeast Asia, with 65,000 cases and an increasing number of cases.
(Article published in English on July 7, 2020)
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