World Health Organization Executive Board adopts resolution on palliative care
23 January 2014
- Image: Dr Stephen Connor, WPCA
Image: Dr Stephen Connor, WPCA
The Executive Board of the World Health
Organization (WHO) has adopted a resolution on palliative care that will
be useful for palliative care advocates in their home countries to
advocate for palliative care.
For the first time, a
stand-alone resolution on palliative care was on the agenda of the World
Health Organization’s Executive Board. The Board considered a report by the WHO secretariat on palliative care, before adopting the resolution: ‘Strengthening of palliative care as a component of integrated treatment within the continuum of care’ to be referred to the World Health Assembly in May.
The resolution urges countries to integrate palliative care into
healthcare systems, to improve training for healthcare workers, and to
ensure that relevant medicines, including strong pain medicines, are
available to patients. It also urges WHO to increase its technical
assistance to member countries on the development of palliative care
services.
Dr Emmanuel Luyirika, Trustee of the Worldwide Palliative Care
Alliance and Chief Executive Officer of the African Palliative Care
Association, addressed the Executive Board of the World Health
Organization ahead of their deliberations on the resolution. He said the
following:
“Madame Chair, Director General, ladies and gentleman, thank you for
the opportunity to make this statement on behalf of Worldwide Palliative
Care Alliance, African Palliative Care Association, and palliative care
associations worldwide. Today is a momentous day: It is the first time
in the history of WHO’s Executive Board that palliative care is on the
board’s agenda as a stand-alone item. Today’s discussion is recognition
of the growing importance of this health service.
We welcome the WHO secretariat’s report, which correctly describes
palliative care as an essential health service that cuts across disease
groups. The report estimates that a minimum of 40 million people
worldwide require palliative care annually. Most are older persons
although at least 6% are children. 80% of the need is in the developing
world. As the report states, the need for palliative care will grow in
decades to come.
More detailed data will be published next week in a joint WHO/WPCA Atlas of Palliative Care at the End of Life.
Although palliative care services can be implemented at relatively
low cost, less than 10% of the need is currently being met. The barriers
to palliative care are well known: A lack of access to essential
medicines for severe pain and other symptoms; a lack of education at all
levels of professional training; a lack of resources to implement
palliative care and lack of policies that integrate it into national
healthcare systems.
As an African physician who has traveled all over the sub-continent, I
have seen up close how many people with chronic illnesses suffer
unnecessarily from pain and other symptoms that could easily be
relieved. The secretariat’s report, this discussion and the draft
resolution that has been developed under Panama’s leadership provide a
unique opportunity to tear down these barriers and put an end to this
unnecessary suffering.”
Commenting on the significance of the adoption of the resolution, Dr
Stephen Connor, WPCA Senior Fellow and co-editor of the forthcoming Global Atlas, said:
“This
is a hugely significant event for palliative care advocates, workers,
patients and families worldwide. WHO has affirmed that palliative care
is needed for people suffering from many communicable and
non-communicable diseases and calls on member states develop policies,
multi-level education, essential medicines access and adequate funding
for palliative care. Also that WHO includes palliative care in health
system plans and that evidence based guidelines be developed. This is
historic for our field.”
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