Neglected Tropical Diseases Debate
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Pauline Latham
Main Page: Pauline Latham (Conservative - Mid Derbyshire)Department Debates - View all Pauline Latham's debates with the Department for International Development
Neglected Tropical Diseases
Pauline Latham Excerpts(12 years, 5 months ago)
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Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Williams. I want to pursue some things that my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy) said, and to congratulate him on securing this debate on such an important subject. He dedicates a huge amount of his time to malaria and NTDs through his chairmanship of the all-party parliamentary group.
As vice-chairman of the all-party groups on HIV and AIDS and on malaria and neglected tropical diseases, I have been struck by the emerging evidence that patients suffering from some NTDs are more likely to contract HIV/AIDS or severe malaria. Dr Peter Hotez writes in his manuscript entitled “The neglected tropical diseases and the neglected infections of poverty: overview of their common features, global disease burden and distribution, new control tools, and prospects for disease elimination” that
“in the case of malaria there is a high degree of geographic overlap with hookworm infection…with evidence to show that co-infections of malaria and hookworm result in severe anemia…Similarly, urinary tract schistosomiasis, which occurs in more than 100 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa…commonly results in female genital schistosomiasis that is associated with a threefold increased susceptibility to HIV/AIDS”.
In other words, if we are effectively to tackle the killers—malaria and HIV/AIDS—we need to treat NTDs at the same time. Given that, will the Minister ask the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria to consider embracing NTDs as well? I appreciate that the fund currently faces financial difficulties, with the cancelation of round 11, but it would be a good start if it could acknowledge the importance of tackling NTDs in the fight against malaria and HIV/AIDS, and encourage its donors to support work on NTDs, just as the UK and the USA are doing.
I also emphasise that by tackling NTDs we are not only working with people to improve their health but helping them to pursue their livelihoods, to escape the very poverty that makes it much more likely that they will contract the diseases, which ensures that the millennium development goal of tackling poverty continues to elude many countries. Many NTDs, if untreated, result in chronic disability and, given that most people who suffer from them are likely to be involved in agriculture or manual labour, such disability severely affects their chances of earning a living.
In conclusion, I congratulate the Government on announcing a fivefold increase in UK support for the work in fighting NTDs. It meets DFID’s criterion for tackling poverty and, given the low cost of treatment and the 2 billion people affected in one way or another, it represents very good value for money.