We live in an era of medical breakthroughs with new ‘wonder drugs’ available to treat conditions that a few decades ago, or even a few years ago in the case of HIV/AIDS, would have proved fatal. For World Health Day 2011, the World Health Organisation (WHO) will launch a worldwide campaign to safeguard these medicines for future generations. Antimicrobial resistance – the theme of World Health Day 2011 – and its global spread, threatens the continued effectiveness of many medicines used today to treat the sick, while at the same time it risks jeopardizing important advances being made against major infectious killers.
To underline this, the WHO public awareness campaign will include a special focus on the HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria epidemics. WHO will call on governments and stakeholders to implement the policies and practices needed to prevent and counter the emergence of highly resistant superbugs, and to also provide appropriate care to those seriously affected by these microbes. Click here to find out more.
