Globalization since the 1940s - Global Health

10 important questions on Globalization since the 1940s - Global Health

Why were the developments of global health unexpected?

- The rapid increase in the pace of trans-regional contacts should, by traditional standards, have led to a corresponding surge in the spread of epidemic disease.
- But while there were some signs of this, new methods of control, expanding from the international public health efforts of the later nineteenth century, actually constituted a greater change.

What was SARS? What did it show?

- The SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) epidemic of 2002-3 was a particularly interesting case in point. The outbreak, which would ultimately kill 774 people, began in China, whose government initially sought to conceal the problem lest it disrupt international contacts of other sorts and emberass the regime.
- The disease spread rapidly, which is what one would expect with globalization: transmissions that in the fourteenth century took years, or in the sixteenth century months, now operated within a matter of days.
- SARS quickly hit a total of 37 countries, mainly in Asia but also including Canada.

What was being done against SARS? Which institution had a large role in it?

- Under guidance from the World Health Organization, affected countries began to organize quarantines of affected areas - WHO at one point advised against any non-essential travel to Toronto - and also screened airline passengers for signs of disease.
- Governments in Singapore, Canada, and (under new policy) China actively enforced coordinated measures of protection.
- By summer 2003 the disease had been contained, with surprisingly little overall damage.
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What did the SARS episode testify?

The SARS episode testifies, this, both to the vulnerability to disease transmission that is part of contemporary globalization and to unprecedentedly effective, though not flawless, global response.

What is the most widespread contemporary global disease? Where did it come from?

- The most widespread contemporary global disease, AIDS, had a less happy history. First developing in Africa, AIDS spread fairly rapidly to the Caribbean and elsewhere, transmitted above all by sexual contacts.
- Some incidence would develop in almost every part of the world, and in the 1980s it was feared that a global health catastrophe might result.

What was being done against the spread of AIDS?

- Global efforts developed to conduct research on possible therapies and to persuade governments and individuals to take measures that might limit the disease's spread.
- Considerable foreign aid and private philanthropy aimed at those African states, mainly in the east and south, where the disease remained particularly acute.
- Expensive treatments available in the wealthier nations did limit the disease.

What major outbreak in several West African countries in 2014 happened? Which countries suffered the most of it?

- A major outbreak of Ebola in several West African countries in 2014 generated another occasion in which global health responses were tested.
- The disease was particularly hard to treat in very poor countries amid peoples who were often quite suspicious of medical intervention.

What was the international response to Ebola? When did eventually end?

- International response to the crisis included quarantines or health checks for travelers from the affected regions.
- Several countries admitted some victims for treatment in their advanced medical centers - though particularly Western aid workers.
- Response on the spot was slower, in part because of the lack of local infrastructure but in part also because funding for the World Health Organization had been cut.
- Nevertheless, international assistance, including groups dispatched by the United States, did gradually bolster local efforts and this particular epidemic was largely ended by 2015.

What health issue did globalization also influence? Which food was more consumed?

- Globalization was directly responsible for a different kind of health issue, one that proved both novel and difficult to treat.
- Improved living standards, and increasing knowledge of the food patterns of the more affluent societies, encouraged growing numbers of people to change their diets, eating more fast foods but particularly consuming more meat - with beef particularly valued.

What consequences did the increase of food consumption have?

- The result had environmental impact, as forests were cleared for cattle that in turn heightened global levels of methane gas.
- And it certainly had human impact. For diet change coincided, particularly in the cities, with decreasing physical activity at work and - with television and computer games - often in play. The result was growing obesity.

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