Clarifying surgery and anesthesia partnerships in response to global surgery and the World Health Organization
- PDF / 229,744 Bytes
- 2 Pages / 595.276 x 790.866 pts Page_size
- 86 Downloads / 155 Views
CORRESPONDENCE
Clarifying surgery and anesthesia partnerships in response to global surgery and the World Health Organization Walter D. Johnson, MD, MBA, MPH . Emmanuel M. Makasa, MD
Received: 30 July 2019 / Revised: 30 July 2019 / Accepted: 30 July 2019 Ó Canadian Anesthesiologists’ Society 2019
To the Editor, We read with interest the recently published manuscript entitled, ‘‘Global surgery and the World Health Organization: indispensable partners to achieve triple billion goals.’’1 We thank Dr. Reddy and colleagues for their efforts to highlight the work of the World Health Organization (WHO) in surgical care and anesthesia. Nevertheless, these attempts to explain the internal workings and agenda of WHO in the context of the Thirteenth General Programme of Work (GPW13), World Health Assembly (WHA) resolutions, and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), fall far short. We would like to correct several inaccuracies in this report to clarify for your readers WHO function, work, and goals. First, the GPW13 is a five-year agenda (not a six-year agenda as indicated by Reddy et al.),1 similar to the WHO Director-General’s term of office. The GPW13 covers the years 2019–2023 and obtained final approval at the 71st WHA in May 2018.A The GPW13 is directly linked to the SDGs and their targets, and provides clear direction to the work of the WHO over these five years. It provides a vision, rooted in Article 1 of the WHO’s constitution—of a
This letter is accompanied by a reply. Please see Can J Anesth 2020; this issue. W. D. Johnson, MD, MBA, MPH (&) Lead Emergency and Essential Surgical Care Programme, WHO, Geneva, Switzerland e-mail: [email protected] E. M. Makasa, MD Wits Centre of Surgical Care for Primary Health and Sustainable Development, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa
world in which all people attain the highest possible standard of health and well-being—and summarizes the WHO’s mission, which is to promote health, keep the world safe, and serve the vulnerable. This indeed covers the triple billion goals over five years. While it is true that the GPW13 does include the sentence: ‘‘[t]here is also a need to increase availability of safe and effective surgical care’’,A nowhere is it stated or implied that using GPW13 to ‘‘strengthen surgical, obstetric, and anesthesia (SOA) systems will enable the global health community and WHO to attain the triple billion goals.’’1 Second, the WHA resolution WHA68.15 on strengthening emergency and essential surgical care and anesthesia as a component of universal health coverage (UHC), was passed unanimously at the 68th WHA in May 2015.2 Dr. Emmanuel Makasa was one of the principal drivers of this resolution while serving as Health Attache´ for the Zambian Permanent Mission to the United Nations Organization in Geneva (2012–2017). While ‘‘emergency and essential surgical care and anaesthesia’’ supports the attainment of good obstetrics and emergency care outcomes, the two areas of work are addressed in separate WHO documents and resolutions. Neverthel
Data Loading...
