Korea leads efforts tackling global health security threats

Kim Gang-lip

By Kim Gang-lip

After the 2015 MERS outbreak, the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) began to provide daily reporting on infectious disease outbreaks occurring and spreading in and outside of Korea. As of the last week of July, the following infectious disease trends were detected worldwide. MERS-CoV continues to occur sporadically in Saudi Arabia. The number of confirmed cases is 158 so far this year.

Bird flu, Avian influenza (H7N9), continues to occur in China. Between 2016 and 2017, there were 759 confirmed cases.

Crimean Congo hemorrhagic fever continues to occur in Iran. So far, 80 cases have been confirmed.

Dengue fever has sharply increased in Sri Lanka, Vietnam and other Southeast Asian Countries. So far, 110,000 cases have been confirmed.

Even at this moment, infectious diseases continue to occur and spread somewhere in the world, causing pain.

What is even worse is that infectious diseases can break out anywhere due to increased cross-border mobility, climate change and other factors.

It was not an overstatement when Bill Gates warned that preparing against large-scale pandemics is the most pressing challenge facing the world.

Between 2014 and 2015, the Ebola outbreak in West Africa brought the death toll to over 10,000.

From that experience, the world learned that infectious disease outbreaks cannot be defeated by the efforts of a single nation.

Against this backdrop, the Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA) was launched in the United States in February 2014.

The GHSA has since grown into a central global committee on health security with 59 participating countries and eight partner international organizations.

Over the past four years since its inception, the GHSA has achieved quite a lot.

To start with, the GHSA has promulgated the Joint External Evaluation (JEE) which enables accurate and objective assessments of individual countries’ public health capabilities.

At the same time, the GHSA has established 11 Action Packages for target areas such as antimicrobial resistance, immunization and zoonotic disease, which aim to strengthen the global capacity to prevent, detect and respond to infectious disease outbreaks.

In addition, the GHSA promoted cooperation among sectors including food, animals, livestock, defense, radiation and chemicals, which may spread biological threats and infectious diseases.

Korea has maintained a strong presence and a critical role in the GHSA.

Since the day of its launch, Korea has actively participated in the GHSA as a steering country.

In 2015, the Korean government successfully hosted a high-level GHSA meeting in Seoul and led the adoption of the Seoul Declaration, the world’s first joint declaration on health security.

In the same year, Korea announced the Safe Life for All Initiative and has since implemented its pledge of offering $100 million between 2016 and 2020 to help support 13 developing countries in Africa and Asia with building public health infrastructure.

Furthermore, Korea has assumed chairmanship of the GHSA steering group comprised of 10 countries for 2017, encouraging participating countries to produce more practical outcomes under the slogan “Take Action.”

This year, the GHSA steering group focuses on compiling model practices for respective Action Packages to help the least-developed countries develop their own national action plans.

Additionally, the scope of multi-sector collaboration has been expanded to include the defense and food sectors.

On the occasion of the 70th World Health Assembly last May, a GHSA side event was held under the chairmanship of Korea and in close collaboration with other participating countries and partners.

The side event was held to raise awareness about health security issues among many countries and international organizations.

Going forward, the role and function of the GHSA will be increasingly emphasized.

This was made evident in the G20 Leaders’ Declaration and the preceding Korea-U.S. Joint Statement.

As a core member of the GHSA, Korea will remain committed to making the world safe and secure from infectious diseases.

Together with other GHSA participating countries and partners, Korea will think bigger and longer to create a master plan for safeguarding humanity against infectious diseases.

The writer is the deputy minister for healthcare policy at the Ministry of Health and Welfare. He is the chair of the GHSA steering group.