vaccines Archives - Humanosphere

vaccines

Gates-backed vaccine alliance targets cervical cancer in poor countries – for a price |

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s biggest, and arguably most successful, project in global health has announced a new deal with vaccine manufacturers aimed at combatting one of the biggest killers of women in the developing world, cervical cancer.

: Seth Berkley; GAVI

“This is a disease that is killing women in the prime of their life,” said Seth Berkley, CEO of the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI), an initiative launched by the Gates Foundation in 2000 which has in the last dozen or so years prevented millions of deaths in children by expanding access to new vaccines in poor countries.

Most cervical cancer is caused by a virus, human papillomoa virus or HPV, and the drug industry has developed a number of HPV vaccines. But these new vaccines are expensive (more than $100 per dose) and have been out-of-reach for most poor countries. Women in rich countries have access to cervical cancer screening (Pap tests) and curative treatment, but women in poor countries generally do not.

“As a result, we see an estimated 275,000 women dying from cervical cancer in these countries every year,” Berkley said. Girls and women in poor countries are hit by a ‘triple whammy,’ he said, of higher disease incidence, lack of diagnosis and lack of treatment. Without access to a preventive vaccine, Berkley said, that death toll will only increase.

GAVI will begin support for HPV vaccines in Kenya as early as this month followed by Ghana, Lao PDR, Madagascar, Malawi, Niger, Sierra Leone and the United Republic of Tanzania. – See more at: http://www.gavialliance.org/library/news/press-releases/2013/hpv-price-announcement/#sthash.gDPujj1x.dpuf

Today, at the World Economic Forum on Africa meeting in Cape Town, South Africa, GAVI announced that two drug companies, Merck and GlaxoSmithKline, have agreed to provide their HPV vaccines to poor countries for $4.50 and $4.60, respectively, per dose. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Health, cervical cancer, GAVI, HPV, Kate Elder, Medicins Sans Frontieres, Seth Berkley, vaccines

May 7, 2013 | 1:00 PM | By Tom Paulson |

Bill Gates’ humanitarian plan for world (vaccination) domination |

: UN

Bill Gates loves vaccines.

He says so all the time. The media, as well as the social media hipsterverse, regularly report on this love affair, usually cheering along with Gates in favor of the cause of polio eradication — a cause which was advanced recently at a meeting he and other glitterati convened in Abu Dhabi, the world’s richest city.

Gates says the very foundation of his foundation comes from his realization in the 1990s that kids were dying for lack of access to a vaccine we in the rich world take for granted. As a result, boosting vaccination worldwide became the prime mover, the raison d’être, for what would soon be the world’s biggest philanthropy.

Yet few appreciate today just how revolutionary, and unlikely, was the start of this love affair.

Promoting this powerful, fundamental tool for children’s health may look now like an obvious humanitarian thing for a philanthropist to do. But it wasn’t either obvious or that celebrated when the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation started down this path (pun intended) in the 1990s.

The Gates Foundation’s push for a revolution in immunization was greeted, from the outset, by a weird combination of controversy and apathy. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Health, Amie Batson, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, GAVI, Kate Elder, Médecins Sans Frontières, Orin Levine, PATH, Seth Berkley, vaccines

February 11, 2013 | 12:54 PM | By Tom Murphy |

Skepticism of vaccine programs overseas made worse by Zero Dark Thirty film |

: Is it foreign aid or covert aid?; Flickr, johanoomen

Journalist Rob Crilly rightfully criticizes the film Zero Dark Thirty for getting its facts wrong about the CIA vaccination campaign that sought to confirm the DNA of bin Laden’s children.

The truth is dangerous enough. But Zero Dark Thirty risks making a difficult situation worse with a clumsy mistake. The real-life Dr Afridi used the cover of a hepatitis vaccination programme, but in the movie his team wear jackets suggesting they are providing polio drops.

For a movie that has claimed to be as factually accurate as possible in the face of criticisms, this is an error that should not have been made. However, Crilly’s larger point is to say that the film gives further ammo to polio vaccine conspiracy theorists. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Basics, CIA, polio, vaccines

CHANGEMAKERS

June 29, 2012 | 2:50 PM | By Tom Paulson |

ChangeMakers: Erin Larsen-Cooper and VillageReach use business enterprise to promote public health |

“Changemakers” is our series exploring how young people, connected and globally aware, are working to change the world. If you know a young person (think “Millennial” or “Gen Y”) committed to change, global health and the fight against poverty, please send the person’s name, short bio and contact info to Jake Ellison at jellison@kplu.org.

By Lisa Stiffler, special correspondent

Erin Larsen Cooper

Erin Larsen-Cooper, 29, is a program associate with VillageReach, and a graduate of the University of Washington and Western Washington University.

In wealthy countries, it’s no problem for an organization to provide a single, narrowly defined service. In a poor community, it won’t always work to focus on singular goal, ignoring the existing challenges that can doom even the most well-intentioned projects.

Take vaccinations.

For the life-saving treatments to work, there needs to be adequate refrigeration during storage and delivery. So when Seattle-based VillageReach teamed up with Mozambique’s Ministry of Health to expand access to vaccines in the country, the non-profit organization realized it needed to help improve refrigeration as well.

But instead of simply handing out the propane needed to power the refrigerators used to chill the vaccines, Seattle-based VillageReach first supported the creation of a business called VidaGas. The idea was to create a self-sustaining business that supported the public health program rather than seek funding from NGOs or the strapped local government agencies. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Changemakers, vaccines, VillageReach

May 15, 2012 | 12:18 PM | By Tom Paulson |

Doctors Without Borders criticizes Gates-backed global vaccine strategy |

Bill Gates at World Health Assembly

The global health strategy to expand childhood immunizations, largely backed by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, is too focused on new vaccines and neglects the fundamental need to improve basic public health and immunization programs in poor countries.

So says Medicins Sans Frontieres (MSF), aka Doctors Without Borders, in a new report issued today by the organization entitled The Right Shot: Extending the Reach of Affordable and Adapted Vaccines.

The medical relief and aid advocacy organization is critical of a new, 10-year, multi-billion dollar “Global Vaccines Action Plan” expected to be adopted by global health leaders at the World Health Assembly meeting next week. The plan is largely funded by the Gates Foundation.

MSF says it favors expanding access to new vaccines — just not at the expense of basic immunizations.

“Twenty percent of the world’s children aren’t even getting the basic vaccines,” said Kate Elder, MSF vaccine policy adviser. The Gates Foundation is driving much of the global health policy decisions around vaccinations, Elder noted, and “Bill Gates’ priority is new vaccines.” The philanthropy’s influence is distorting the agenda to favor new vaccines over basic improvements, she said.

Daniel Berman, MSF’s deputy director for access, cited a recent initiative to distribute a new $7-per-dose pneumococcal vaccine in DR Congo in the middle of a measles outbreak. Why, Berman asked, are donors and health agencies pushing this new, expensive vaccine in Congo if Congolese children still aren’t getting a 30-cent measles vaccine?

The approach appears aimed more at supporting drug industry desires to promote new products than at finding the most efficient and sustainable means for fighting the diseases of poverty, he said.

UNICEF

The Right Shot may be a new report from MSF, but it is hardly a new criticism of the Gates Foundation’s approach to vaccines. Others have criticized the philanthropy before for a tendency to place industry interests above the concerns of poverty advocates.

The Seattle philanthropy, though contacted in advance of the report’s release, declined to comment or respond today to the MSF criticism – or to the group’s call for a new global strategy with more emphasis on beefing up basic, routine immunizations. The organization sponsored by the foundation to promote the new global strategy, the Decade of Vaccines collaboration, also did not respond.

Jeffrey Rowland, spokesman for the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization, GAVI, did respond to the criticism. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Health, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Doctors Without Borders, GAVI, Medicins Sans Frontieres, vaccines, World Health Organization

April 27, 2012 | 10:42 AM | By Tom Paulson |

The weird adventures of VacciBoy and ImmuGirl |

The World Health Organization has a media campaign using cartoon super heroes to promote vaccination. In case you weren’t aware, this week was declared by WHO to be Vaccination Week.

So here they are, VacciBoy and ImmuGirl, gaining their superpowers by drinking liquids they discovered on the counter of a biomedical research lab.

Secondary message: “Hey kids, drink weird liquids you find in research labs and you’ll be a super hero!”

WHO

WHO says:

Welcome to the amazing world of VacciBoy and ImmuGirl. Through a series of episodes, you will learn about dangerous viruses, that are living around us and how to protect you and people you love against them. You will find entertaining and fun activities while you learn about many health threats. You will meet the viruses and how bad they are for our health and will discover how Vacciboy and Immugirl acquired their special powers to fight them.

Yes, but seriously kids: Don’t drink strange liquids in labs!

I watched a few of these videos and laughed out loud they are so bad. But sometimes being really bad can be pretty effective, by virtue of kitsch power or maybe something like reverse psychology. We’ll see.

Improving immunization rates around the world should be, and is, promoted as a top priority in global health. There may be no more effective single health intervention than a vaccine. Here are a few more straightforward reports and articles on this:

Reuters Two new vaccines introduced in Ghana

GAVI Millions of deaths averted, millions more to be saved

ONE Don’t ease up on global vaccination

But even if these WHO cartoons work (and I have my doubts), I wondered why try to sell immunization to kids? Are kids the ones deciding not to get themselves vaccinated? Are kids warning their parents against vaccines based on mistaken ideas? Are kids determining health policies? Are kids telling Congress to cut funding of foreign aid and these kind of global health measures?

As Einstein said, the first step to solving a problem is in properly defining it. Kids are not the problem here. VacciBoy and ImmuGirl mean well, but they would do better buzzing the halls of Congress and doing battle with irresponsible parents and policy makers.

FILED UNDER: Health, vaccines, World Health Organization

January 12, 2012 | 10:56 AM | By Tom Paulson |

India marks one year without polio, inches toward eradication goal line |

UNICEF

Child receives polio vaccine

India will have made it one year, as of Friday, without a reported case of polio — a milestone everyone in the global health community is celebrating.

Except for maybe all those skeptics who say, or said, polio will never be eradicated.

The goal here is a world completely without polio, of course, since if this infectious disease exists anywhere it can spread everywhere — as China recently discovered.

But this accomplishment by India, which not that long ago had the world’s lion share of polio cases, does a lot to get us closer to the day when this crippling, sometimes deadly, disease is eradicated.

I’ve seen the ravages of polio in poor countries and, back in 2003 when I was a reporter for the Seattle PI, traveled to parts of India where the polio cases were exploding and reported on the country’s difficulties trying to rid itself of this infectious disease.

It may sound a simple enough goal to vaccinate all kids against polio, but it’s not. I can attest to how complex and challenging it has been — because of the nature of this disease, the lack of health care resources in the countries most in need and the various forms of political opposition that can emerge to obstruct what might seem to many an obvious good.

India’s not out of the woods yet and the disease remains entrenched in three countries, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Nigeria. But the fact that India appears to have completely rid itself of this disease is evidence that the global campaign to eradicate polio is that much closer to reality.

Indian health officials deserve a lot of credit for reaching this milestone, but credit for getting us where we are today should go first to Rotary International — which for decades has sustained the global vaccination effort against all odds (and lots of skepticism) — and then to organizations like UNICEF, the World Health Organization and, lately, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The Gates Foundation has thrown a lot of money at this effort over the last ten years or so. Both Bill Gates and his father Bill Sr. also have been outspoken public champions of polio eradication — even to the point of apparently finally winning over the world’s leading polio eradication skeptic D.A. Henderson.

Here’s Bill Gates’ celebrating India’s achievement on Huffington Post

FILED UNDER: Health, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, eradication, India, polio, Rotary International, UNICEF, vaccines, World Health Organization

October 18, 2011 | 9:00 AM | By Tom Paulson |

Queen of England bestows honor on PATH’s gizmo guy |

Flickr, UK Ministry of Defence

Queen Elizabeth

The Queen of England has bestowed an exalted honor on PATH’s top gizmo guy.

“She said global health was a rather big subject and must involve a lot of travel,” said Michael Free, chief of technology for PATH, who had in fact stopped off in London to be received by the Queen before embarking on a month-long trip of global health travel.

Last week, Free was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in recognition of his team’s many inventions and innovative approaches aimed at helping solve health problems in the developing world. It’s not quite as prestigious as a Knighthood but better than a sharp poke in the helmet.

PATH

Michael Free

One of Free’s inventions was the single-use, auto-disabling syringe — a device now in common use worldwide, here in the U.S. as well, aimed at reducing the transmission of disease through accidental needle sticks.

But Free was also likely honored for his much broader and critical role in helping give birth to PATH in the 1970s.

How this British farm boy, raised in creamy Devonshire, ended up in Seattle working on some of the most innovative solutions to developing world health problems offers insight into the evolution of PATH and, to some extent, the entire field of global health.

“In the beginning, our approach was not well-received by either the public or private sectors,” said Free. “It was a bit out-of-the-box.”

Continue reading →