Passing through Argentina, where she arrived with a delegation from the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the agency’s interim deputy director, Debra Hori, assured Tellum that “Covid-19 taught that a virus is not this country.” -specific” and “improved monitoring and cooperation between nations”.
A past president of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine and the Society for the Advancement of Injury and Violence Research in the United States, Hauri worked on issues such as injuries, overdose and violence in public health, and issues related to mental health.
Clearly pleased with the joint work they are doing with Argentina, the CDC official carved a niche for himself on his tight diplomatic agenda and met with Telam to discuss the trip, but also other urgent and important topics. In too.
– What is the purpose of CDC’s visit to Argentina?
– At CDC we have regional forums: Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, the Middle East and North Africa, and it is this that corresponds to South America, headquartered in Brazil. The aim is to work together to detect any public health threat and prevent it from spreading to other areas. During meetings with Minister (Health, Carla) Vizotti, we talked about Covid-19, childhood vaccination programmes, antimicrobial resistance and Legionella.
“We have a lot to learn from Argentina regarding its new legislation and the issuance of electronic prescriptions, and it is also interesting to coordinate with the provinces and work with the National Reference Laboratory”
– Is this joint surveillance policy a product of COVID-19 or was it a previous policy?
– The idea was to do this joint work but it was anticipated to start in 2020 and the pandemic gripped us; This idea arose from other past diseases, such as Ebola, Mers, other Sars and Zika. What the pandemic did was speed up the implementation time and certainly highlight the need and importance of this work. For example, in the face of this outbreak of Legionella passing through Argentina, we can work together and collaborate to first determine what the pathogen is and, once we have it, what the responses should be. and how it should work. If it weren’t Legionella and it was a new respiratory virus, joint work would also allow us to start prevention much faster. What we learned with COVID is that a virus cannot be specific to a country, as it can emerge in Argentina and jump into Brazil and thus spread to the whole world. Therefore, it is very important to strengthen the surveillance system.
Dr. Debra Horry, Interim Deputy Director, and a delegation from the US Centers for Disease Control met with the Ministry of Health today @carlavizzotti To strengthen bilateral cooperation and discuss joint work on antimicrobial resistance. pic.twitter.com/8dHPqSrpas
— embasieuurg (@EmbajadaEEUUarg) 13 September 2022
We are also going through another health emergency due to monkeypox.
– What are we doing with monkeypox, what are we doing for all these diseases: surveillance, detection, vaccination, treatment in people who have got it, and prevention, ie identification of people at risk and make it clear what are the measures to prevent infection. It is the same with any infectious disease: the idea is to detect, respond and prevent.
– What will be the most urgent public health problems around the world?
– They are many. Of course the first is still Covid-19. We have a lot of overdose problems in America; And there are other infectious diseases in the world like measles and polio that are making a comeback. High blood pressure and diabetes is a very common problem in the elderly when it comes to different stages of life. The issue of antimicrobial resistance is also a worldwide problem. Today I was telling the minister (Vizoti) that 25 years ago we had a patient who died because we did not find an antibiotic capable of controlling that microorganism. In this case it is very important to test the organism and to think that it saves our life. In this sense, we have a lot to learn from Argentina regarding its new legislation and the issuance of electronic prescriptions, and we also find it interesting to coordinate with the provinces and work with the National Reference Laboratory.
– What lessons does covid leave?
– One of the things we realized is that we need data, information to detect viruses and act more quickly to respond. As humanity we also learned that social distancing has to be followed but that distance led us to increase in social isolation and in some cases mental problems. COVID had an impact on the most vulnerable, not only physically but also on mental health. We learned that building prevention and support networks is essential for those who are most at risk. With regard to vaccines, we also have something to learn from Argentina because the vaccines have been very well received. Argentina has a high vaccination rate in general, not only for Covid but also for polio and measles.
– You mentioned the impact on mental health, the CDC did some studies on the matter…
Yes, we have all seen an increase in mental health problems. We are now returning to pre-pandemic levels, but there is a mental health impact that remains in the younger population. The important thing is to understand that mental health problems existed before COVID and what COVID did was make them worse or exacerbate them.
Warnings for gender inequality and poverty, and praise for the 1,000-day law
Gender inequality and a lack of access to basic rights such as education or health resulting from poverty are two causes of violence globally, Debra Hory, interim deputy director of the Centers for the Control and Prevention of Disease, indicated in an interview. Telum Disease of the United States (CDC).
Public health problems caused by violence are one of the issues you have worked on all your life. Can common causes be traced between different countries and regions?
Poverty can lead to increased violence towards others and towards oneself. But this is not because of being poor, but because poverty limits access to education, health and social support.
Another issue is exposure to violence in childhood; If a boy or girl is exposed to violence because he is a victim or because he sees it, or because his parents have drug or mental problems, there is a higher chance that, in addition to becoming a victim, he The child will be a perpetrator of violence.
In this context, very interesting is the Argentine 1000 days law, which, in addition to vaccination, is in charge of seeing what the life situation of the child is.
Lastly, the issue of gender equality also affects violence because countries with greater gender inequality tend to generate more domestic violence.
-You mentioned the issue of overdoses in the United States. In Argentina and around the world, problematic drug use remains an unresolved issue. What is your opinion of the most effective strategy?
The first thing to do is to work with children to protect them from addiction, to make sure there are safe prescriptions for drugs that can be used as drugs, and we need to understand that require that just as someone in pain receive treatment, a person with an addiction problem must receive treatment to prevent them from getting worse or dying from an overdose
It is then necessary to devise harm reduction policies such as providing treatment to avoid overdose or educating so that syringes are not shared.
