Globalization and Health
Friday, May 12, 2006
How is globalisation linked to health?
Humans have lived with continual change since the migration of Homo erectus out of Africa a million years ago. Globalisation, in this sense, has gone hand in hand with the evolution of human societies.
It would be overly simplistic and inaccurate to describe globalisation as either 'good' or 'bad' for health.
The impact of globalization on healthy may defer from country to country. For low and middle-income countries, the debate surrounding globalization on health would be of acquiring certain acute and epidemic infections, such as HIV/AID. For high-income countries, they may fear the potential financial burden of unhealthy populations migrating from the developing world. The increased movement of people and other items, through globalization, would create complex equations of pluses and minuses for each society, which I would elaborate below.
Example 1: Export and Import
There are risks that high-income countries may export to other parts of the world products such as tobacco and fast food and, more indirectly, macroeconomic policies that may affect foreign direct investment and debt burdens.
Example 2: Spread of disease.
Negative impact:
The speed of modern transportation systems means that infections can potentially move around the world within a few hours (as illustrated by the SARS outbreak in 2002-03). And the recently case of H1N5 virus also further prove this point.
Positive impact:
On the other hand, modern technology potentially enables the health community to respond more quickly to such emergencies. For example, an international network of institutions coordinated by the World Health Organization (WHO) via global telecommunications can readily detect and rapidly respond to changes in the influenza virus- such a capacity was unavailable after the First World War, when an estimated 20 million people died of influenza worldwide.
Example 3: Cognitive changes brought about by advertising and marketing Western consumer goods have facilitated the global spread of so-called 'lifestyle' diseases (eg, obesity) in certain populations within low- and middle-income countries.
Negative impact:
The shift in the tobacco pandemic to the developing world has been clearly driven by the tobacco industry. It is estimated that, by 2030, 70% of all tobacco-related deaths (7 million annually) will occur in developing countries.
Positive impact:
Global consciousness is also leading to the increased sharing of principles, ethical values and standards that underpin decision making about health. Examples of this are the 1964 Helsinki declaration on ethical principles for medical research involving human subjects, the International code on the marketing of breast-milk substitutes adopted by the WHO and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in 1981, and the Framework convention on tobacco control adopted by the WHO in 2003.
Therefore, it is important to understand that the effect of globalisation on health is both positive and negative.
Like Dr Dolittle's 'push-me-pull-you', it is unclear at present in which direction globalisation will lead us.
brought to you by: xiu (health and environment expert)
