Commemorating World Health Day

In his State of the Union address, President Obama called upon our nation to join with the world in ending extreme poverty in the next two decades. Today, we have new tools that enable us to achieve a goal that was simply unimaginable in the past: the eradication of extreme poverty and its most devastating corollaries, including widespread hunger and preventable child and maternal death.

Preventing and controlling vector-borne diseases, diseases carried by insects, ticks and small animals, is central to achieving President Obama’s vision of ending extreme poverty. On World Health Day, commemorated each year on April 7, the World Health Organization (WHO) highlights actions we can all take to protect ourselves from the serious diseases that these “vectors” can cause.

Children wash their hands in Ghana, where USAID supports prevention and treatment of trachoma, a blinding eye disease.
International Trachoma Initiative (ITI) ..

More than half of the world’s population is at risk from vector-borne diseases, such as malaria, dengue fever and neglected tropical diseases. The most commonly known vectors include mosquitoes, sandflies, bugs, ticks and snails, which are responsible for transmitting a wide range of parasites and pathogens contributing to deadly diseases.

Senegal: Demonstrating the proper use of ITNs in Senegal. Photo Credit: Maggie Hallahan

Below, we highlight solutions to combat extreme poverty and vector-borne diseases.

Solutions

• In this scene-setter, USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah explains how USAID and its partners have embraced the challenge of creating a world without extreme poverty.
• In “A Call to Action to End Extreme Poverty,” Alex Thier and Ilyse Stempler discuss how USAID and its partners are adopting an integrated, holistic approach that capitalizes on their collective expertise. They share past successes in addressing extreme poverty and introduce some new ideas to finish the job.
• In “Your Voice,” a continuing FrontLines feature, Adm. Tim Ziemer, U.S. Global Malaria Coordinator, shares his perspective on leading a major presidential initiative to end deaths from malaria. 
• Katherine Sanchez profiles Ghana’s efforts to become the first country in sub-Saharan Africa to eliminate trachoma, the world’s leading cause of preventable blindness.
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  A Yumbe survey team learns how to use electronic tablets to collect data on trachoma.
  Christine Ninsiima

  And in “Trachoma vs. Technology,” Phil Downs and Scott Torres uncover efforts to capture and analyze data quickly on mobile electronic tablets in rural Uganda. This approach is transforming the battle against an ancient eye disease, for which timely treatment can prevent blindness.

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  Students prepare to take part in a mapping survey at Pav Primary School in Rattanakiri.
  Credit: Chan Vitharin ..

  In “Wiping Snail Fever Off Cambodia’s Map – by Drawing It On,” Sokhon Sea delves into an effort to enlist many, including school children, on a mission to wipe out the infection that can lead to debilitating illness and malnutrition and cognitive difficulties in children.

• Finally, Ann Varghese and Chris Glass explore a unique drug-shoe combination that could stomp out two debilitating diseases endemic to Haiti and how wearing new sneakers kicks up that protection even more by creating a barrier between parasites and kids’ feet.