Tokyo- Investing in the world's ability to respond epidemic "is really invest in the resilience of the global economic system," said Group President of the World Bank Jim Yong Kim today in advance of an international meeting in Japan.
Kim met with reporters in Tokyo before a conference on the reduction of the UN disaster risk which begins tomorrow in Sendai. Last October, after what he called a global response "late, insufficient and slow" to the Ebola epidemic, Kim launched the idea of an emergency installation pandemic. Today, he expanded the idea, including why the World Bank should be involved.
He said natural disasters and epidemics have a devastating impact on economic growth, with countries and least able to afford it bear the greatest burden citizens. The World Bank estimated that the Ebola epidemic takes a bite of $ 1.6 billion on the economies of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. "Before the beginning of the epidemic, the three countries had some of the highest [economic] The growth rates in the world, and now their rates should be near or below zero," he said
the World Bank has committed over $ 500 million to deal with the crisis, but the money began to flow 8 months after the start of epidemic, he said. "We need to respond more quickly to the next outbreak," he said. And that requires better planning.
The emergency department pandemic proposed to build on lessons Ebola from the crisis. "the World health Organization [WHO] must be the center of the response," said Kim, a physician and anthropologist who once headed the HIV / AIDS department of wHO. It said the WHO response capacity has deteriorated in recent years and needs to be restored. "If we had enough money to WHO, I think we could have put the Ebola outbreak much earlier, "he said.
Kim said the response to larger epidemics, he considered inevitable, require coordination between a number of UN agencies. For example, the World Food Programme could provide expertise in moving supplies, while the United Nations Children's Fund could apply his knowledge of working with basic health networks. But these roles must be defined in advance, he said. He would also see the creation of a large reserve corps of doctors and nurses for emergency duty and periodic exercises "to be ready for us when major events occur," he said.
Planning a major health emergency should involve financial and business stakeholders in the public and private sectors, he noted, that epidemics can wreak havoc on the economy. Bring the table to insurance companies will help focus attention on the economic risks of disease outbreaks, he argued, and pharmaceutical, transportation and communications companies all have a vital role to play in response to a epidemic disease.
Kim said he was struggling to attract the attention of finance ministers and bank officials when he worked in public health. But now that he is president of the World Bank, he said, "they should listen."
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