Government Chief Scientific Adviser tackles African health matters

Discussion of growing problems of global population and climate change - News

Friday 16 November 2007
By Naomi Weston

The burdening problem of an ever increasing global population was discussed by Sir David King, Chief Scientific Adviser to the Government at the ‘Africa: Health Matters?’ conference, held this week.

The conference focused on the social, economic and geographical variations associated with AIDS/HIV, schistosomiasis and malaria and the healthcare issues surrounding them. Sir David explained how the increasing population was affecting a number of global issues including water resources, food supplies, energy consumption and the spread of disease.

He looked at how the increase in life expectancy around the world has inevitably led to the increased global population. He said, "Life expectancy around the world has increased dramatically over the years but in Africa all these advantages seen in the rest of the world are still absent." He added, "Instead of focusing on consumerism and GDP growth we need to refocus on wellbeing."

The main problems affecting Africa highlighted by Sir David are disease, poverty, education, conflict, corruption agriculture, climate change and the water deficit. He said the main issues surrounding water availability were population growth and climate change.

But what can be done to address these issues?

Discussing sustainable development, Sir David said: "Human capital is a key factor; investment needs to be made in skills, infrastructure and cultural development. Education right across the board is also vital from primary and secondary school through to higher education."

Sir David also drew attention to the government’s Foresight programme. Foresight brings together key people, knowledge and ideas to look beyond normal planning horizons to identify potential opportunities from new science and technologies. An example of this is a recent project on the detection and identification of infectious diseases.

The recent outbreak of Bird Flu, H5N1, was also discussed in his speech. "Here we have in place big preparations in case the disease spreads,” explained Sir David, “but what about preparations in Africa?"

He concluded by saying that science and technology were vital for good governance, stability and human capital. "A technically skilled population is a prerequisite for economic sustainability and wellbeing."

Professor Alan Fenwick, Director of the Schistosomiasis Control Initiative and Professor of Tropical Parasitology at Imperial College also gave a presentation at the conference.

Entitled ‘Schistosomiasis and other parasitic diseases in Africa’, he discussed how over 500 million people in Africa are infected with one or more infections which cause these Negelcted Tropical Diseases but they cannot afford the drugs that exist to combat them. He highlighted the issue of schistosomiasis which causes 280,000 deaths a year and has infected 200 million people worldwide.

The Schistosomiasis Control Initiative (SCI) at Imperial College was established in 2002 and works with Ministries of Health and Education to help combat these issues. It aims to encourage development of a sustainable schistosomiasis control programme in sub Saharan Africa and reduce schistosomiasis-related morbidity in high risk groups.

Other speakers at the event included: Professor William Makogoba, Vice Chancellor, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, South Africa; Professor Fotis Kafatos, Chair in Immunogenomics, Imperial College; Dr Mark Walport, Director, The Wellcome Trust; Professor Sir Roy Anderson, Rector Elect, Imperial College; Prerna Banati, The Global Fund and Dr Kara Hanson, from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.

The conference was jointly organised by Imperial College London and the Royal Geographical Society with the Institute of British Geographers.