Pneumonia Outbreak In China

GS Paper II International Relations

Context:

The World Health Organization has made an official request to China for information about a potentially worrying spike in respiratory illnesses and clusters of pneumonia in children.

More than three years after cases were first detected in Wuhan, debate still rages around the origins of Covid-19.
Scientists are divided between two main theories of the cause: an escape from a laboratory in the city where such viruses were studied and an intermediate animal that infected people at a local market.
China’s Response: China’s National Health Commission outlined that the respiratory illness spike was due to the lifting of Covid-19 restrictions and the circulation of known pathogens, namely influenza and common bacterial infections that affect children, including mycoplasma pneumonia.

Pneumonia

Pneumonia is a general medical term used to describe an infection and inflammation of the lungs.
It can be caused by many different viruses, bacteria, or fungi.
- Streptococcus pneumoniae is the most common cause of bacterial pneumonia in children.
Symptoms tend to include chest pain, coughing, fever, and fatigue.
Available Vaccine:
- Pneumococcal Conjugate Vaccine: It was introduced by Govt. of India in 2017 in a phased manner across the most affected five states of India viz., Bihar, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh.
  - Thereafter, the PCV under the Universal Immunization Programme (UIP) has been expanded throughout the country.
Disease Burden: Pneumonia accounts for 14% of all deaths of children under 5 years old
Initiatives Related to Pneumonia:
- Social Awareness and Action to Neutralize Pneumonia Successfully (SAANS)
- Integrated Action Plan for Prevention and Control of Pneumonia and Diarrhoea (IAPPD)’
- WHO and UNICEF had launched Global Action Plan for Pneumonia and Diarrhoea (GAPPD)

Pneumonia

World Health Organization (WHO)

Founded in 1948, WHO is the United Nations specialized agency for Health.
Headquarters: Geneva, Switzerland.
Objectives:
- Lead global efforts to expand universal health coverage.
- Focus on the areas of disease prevention, control and elimination, and the promotion of health and well-being.
Funding: WHO gets its funding from two main sources: Member States paying their assessed contributions (countries’ membership dues), and voluntary contributions from Member States and other partners.

WHO’s Regulation :

The International Health Regulations (2005), or IHR (2005), represents a binding international legal agreement involving 196 countries across the globe, including all the Member States of WHO.
- Aim: to help the international community prevent and respond to acute public health risks that have the potential to cross borders and threaten people worldwide.
Public health emergency of international concern: A PHEIC is defined in the IHR (2005) as, “an extraordinary event which is determined to constitute a public health risk to other States through the international spread of disease and to potentially require a coordinated international response”
The Emergency Committee is made up of international experts who provide technical advice to the WHO Director-General in the context of a “public health emergency of international concern” (PHEIC).
The Director-General makes the final determination of a PHEIC and Temporary Recommendations to address the situation.