Indian Doctors - WHO Siphoning Funds for Industry Profit.

[Guest guest]

*ALL **INDIA** DRUG ACTION NETWORK (AIDAN)**

*(http://aidanindia. wordpress. com/)

 

Rational Drugs and Vaccines for All!

 

**57, Tejaswinagar, Dharwad 580002, **India**, Tel & fax +91- 836- 2461722 (

**drdabade (AT) gmail (DOT) com**)

* A-60, Hauz Khas, **New Delhi** 110016, **India**, Tel: +91-11-26512385 (

mirashiva (AT) gmail (DOT) com)*

 

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4th July 2009

 

To,

Dr Margaret Chan,-General of WHO,

Geneva

 

Dear Dr Chan,

 

This is in continuation of Drug Action Forum – Karnataka’s (DAF-K – is a

member of AIDAN) letter dated 2nd September 2008, regarding the “revelationâ€

regarding the pneumococcal vaccine that is being promoted by WHO globally

and in India that “for every four children in whom pneumonia is prevented,

two children develop asthma because of the vaccineâ€. Subsequently AIDAN in

its letter dated 10th February 2009 had further reiterated the same concerns

and in addition AIDAN members appreciated your comments in the 'The Lancet'

dated 15th January 2009, titled " Primary health care as a route to health

security " .*

 

Your personal assistant Alison Porri, has acknowledged having received

DAF-K’s letter on 4th September 2008, promising that “Your letter will be

carefully reviewed and a response will be forthcomingâ€. After repeated

reminders, AIDAN received a reply on 3rd April 2009, where in you mention

that

 

" We think that the introduction of pneumococcal vaccines, where merited by

evidence of the disease burden, would be of tremendous benefit, saving many

lives, particularly of children. WHO stands ready to assist its Member

States to assess the need for the use of specific new vaccines, to aid in

decision-making, prioritization and introduction, and to work on solutions

for financing them. We look forward to creating a world where no person

should die of a vaccine-preventable disease and to cooperating with

countries and partners to realize this goal.â€

 

AIDAN has reservations about the first sentence of this statement because a

letter published in the Lancet (2nd to 8th July) points out how this policy

in effect siphons off money to vaccine manufacturers; the funds that are

actually donated for the MDG without commensurate benefit for the children.

For the pneumococcal vaccine the letter suggests that $250,000 will be spent

to prevent 4 children getting pneumonia. Instead the 4 cases could have been

treated by WHO protocol for $1each.

 

The journal Vaccine of 9 July 2009 (Mathew JL Pneumococcal vaccination in

developing countries: Where does science end and commerce begin? Vaccine 27

(2009) 4247–4251) has also published a scathing indictment of the WHO

recommendation on the pneumococcal vaccine and what WHO considers ‘evidence

of the disease burden’ enough to merit vaccination.

 

This is what the WHO recommendation states

 

“WHO considers that it should be a priority to include this vaccine in

national immunization programmes, particularly in countries where mortality

among children aged <5 years is >50/1000 live births or where >50,000

children die annuallyâ€. (No authors cited. Pneumococcal conjugate vaccine

for childhood immunization – WHO position paper. Wkly Epidemiol Rec

2007;82:pp. 93–104.)

 

The author point out that the first criteria of under five mortality

>50/1000 live births was met by 32 countries but the total population to be

vaccinated was 18 million. By including the criteria dependent on

population size of ‘where >50,000 children die annually’ only 7 additional

countries were added but it added 161 million to the numbers eligible for

vaccination (in populous countries of India, China and Brazil). The WHO

recommendations seem dictated by needs of increasing demand for vaccines and

profits for manufacturers rather than the needs of public health.

 

We earnestly appeal to you to reexamine how recommendations are arrived at

by the WHO or else repeated exposures of this nature will erode the very

credibility of the WHO. AIDAN and its members restate its demand that it

should review its stand on the wrong advice given towards the vaccine in

question.

 

Please let us know what action you propose to correct this or whether you

think the policy needs no correction, as you did when we wrote last time.

 

*The entire correspondence can be accessed at:- http://alturl. com/dkty

 

Yours truly

 

Dr Gopal Dabade,

drdabade (AT) gmail (DOT) com

 

Dr Jacob Puliyal,

puliyel (AT) gmail (DOT) com

 

Dr Mira Shiva,

mirashiva (AT) gmail (DOT) com

 

Dr Anurag Bhargav,

abhar786

 

Mr Srinivasan,

sahajbrc (AT) youtele (DOT) com

 

Dr Anant Phadke,

anant.phadke@ gmail.com

 

--

http://novartisboyc ott.org/petition

 

Dr Gopal Dabade,

57, Tejaswinagar,

Dharwad 580 002

Tel 0836-2461722

Cell (0)9448862270

www.jagruti. org

http://aidanindia. wordpress. com/

www.daf-k.cjb. net