Value of Life

January 21st, 2005 at 18:14 Björn Hallberg

The WHO is once again warning against the possible evolution of the Avian influenza (H5N1) into more virulent strains. The entire region is one big Petri dish in terms of being densely populated and having an abundance of poultry farms as well as other wild and domesticated animals in close proximity. One could say it’s only a matter of time before the H5N1 bird flu virus is back with a vengeance as it were. The question is what people in general and the pharmaceutical companies are doing to prepare for a possible outbreak. I guess the United States and their ‘coalition of the ignorant’ would tell us that ‘evolution is only a theory’. They say a little Gallow’s humour can ease the stress …

WHO is urging that measures be taken with regard to vaccine production and control. Needless to say not much has been done about it so far and WHO itself has no capacity to manufacture the necessary vaccine, only advise and come up with recommendations. And that has been noted. No doubt that whatever happens, ‘certain people’ will do their best to make it seem that the WHO didn’t do enough or overplayed the danger.

They also warn that "many of the public health interventions that successfully contained SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) will not be effective against a disease that is far more contagious, has a short incubation period, and can be transmitted before the onset of symptoms."

But here is what it comes down to. Human life has a definitive price these days. It is not cost efficient to mass produce vaccine on the off chance that the world’s foremost experts on the matter might be right.
And it doesn’t help either that it is all happening in a relatively undeveloped part of the world. One that can’t pay for fancy new drugs and the pharmaceutical companies know this of course. They would not react until the pandemic is at their doorstep and it is too late to act. I have no doubt that we will be able to halt the spread eventually, regardless … but people will die needlessly. It is also a problem that rapid vaccine manufacturing techniques are often patented. Often by companies that themselves have no potential to supply the world with vaccine. They just hog the intellectual property. One can be sure they will not easily surrender those patents.

Will this be a lesson, not easily forgotten, about the pitfalls of commercialization, privatization and insane IP rights? We will see.

Entry 14 filed under: World. This entry was posted 3 years, 10 months ago. RSS feed for comments on this post.