PRESS CONFERENCE BY MOROCCO ON TRACHOMA INITIATIVE

PRESS CONFERENCE BY MOROCCO ON TRACHOMA INITIATIVE

Blinding trachoma could be eliminated in Morocco by 2005, Dr. Joseph

A. Cook, Executive Director of the International Trachoma Initiative (ITI), told correspondents at a Headquarters press conference this afternoon.  Sponsored by the Permanent Mission of Morocco, the conference was held to announce the success of the country’s trachoma control programme.

"I'm delighted that the ITI, Pfizer and the Moroccan Health Ministry have combined medicine, moral commitment and clinical expertise in treating large patient populations suffering from or at risk for trachoma," said C. L. Clemente of Pfizer Inc., Chairman of the Board of ITI.  The success in Morocco had provided a model for going forward.  The programme would now be expanded to Niger, Nepal and Ethiopia, who would join the United Republic of Tanzania, Sudan, Mali, Viet Nam, Ghana and Morocco as beneficiaries.

Dr. Youssef Chami-Khazraji of the Moroccan Health Ministry, as well as Hank McKinnel, CEO of Pfizer Inc., also participated in the press conference, with Jeffery Mecaskey, Programme Director of ITI available for questions.

Dr. Cook said that blinding trachoma was an ancient disease, the reason for many of the eye hospitals in the United States and Europe and a cause for exclusion of immigrants to New York in the early part of the century.  Currently, the poorest of the poor were still at risk.  Globally, 146 million people had active infections and about 6 million had been blinded or visually impaired. 

The strategy employed by the programme combined prevention with treatment in countries where health infrastructure needed to be augmented for sustained control.  It required partnerships with governments, and was supported by the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in some countries, as well as with non-governmental organizations, foundations and private enterprise. 

Central to the strategy, said Dr. Cook, was Zithromax, a powerful antibiotic donated by Pfizer.  A single oral dose replaced six weeks of eye ointment for controlling the active infection.

In announcing that $200 million worth of Zithromax would be donated in the next phase of the programme, Mr. McKinnel said, however, that medication had no value in poor areas unless it reached the patient and was part of a sustainable strategy that included education, sanitation and improved health facilities.  For those reasons, partnership with national and local authorities was key in any such initiative.

Accordingly, the success in Morocco was due, in part, to political commitment at the highest levels and across the board, said Dr. Chami-Khazraji, in order to reach the 2005 goal.  In five target provinces, 2 million doses had been distributed, an information campaign was staged and the programme was dovetailed into other socio-economic initiatives.  As a result, Morocco may become the first country participating in the initiative to wipe out the disease.  

Such participating countries, with the expansion of the programme, held

20 per cent of trachoma cases worldwide, said Mr. Clemente.  Progress in all of them would bring the world much closer to meeting the WHO's goal of eliminating trachoma by the year 2020.  The ITI itself looked forward to further expansion in the future.  Because of success in existing programmes, support continued to build; Pfizer and the Edna McConnel Clark Foundation had been joined by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the United Kingdom Department for International Development, the Starr Foundation, the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, the Dibner Fund, the Azumi Foundation and a host of private donors.

In response to a correspondent's question about the 2020 goal, Dr. Cook said that it related only to blinding trachoma and not to the elimination of trachoma itself, or infection with the bacteria Chlamydia trachtomatis, which was common in many regions.  Blindness resulted when the eyelid was scarred by repeated infection and that could be practicably controlled by the ITI strategy of treatment and prevention.

Another correspondent asked what the benefits of the initiative were to Pfizer.  Mr. McKinnel said that, besides increasing economic growth and trade in certain areas, efforts such as this one gave pride and significance to the employees of Pfizer around the world.  Asked if there would be any benefit to be gained from producing medications in Africa, he replied that active ingredients were produced in various factories around the world, with the finished dosage completed in a part of Brooklyn, New York, where it had been an important part of a struggling neighbourhood's economy for the past 150 years.

Replying to a question about regional partnerships, he said that in health initiatives those were not nearly as important as strong partnerships with local and national authorities.  Ministries of health were essential partners in many areas, and government support was needed to deal with administrative problems and to staunch any corruption.  Medication diverted for the purpose of enriching individuals would cause programmes to fail.

Correspondents also asked about the extension of the partnership into other health areas, and about UNICEF's role in the partnership.  Dr. Chami-Khazraji said that the measures being taken to ensure the success of the project would inevitably impact on other diseases as well.  In Morocco, not only water-borne diseases but also respiratory diseases, had plummeted along with the rates of chlamydia infection.  The UNICEF was involved in facilitating access, enlisting the involvement of civil society and in better tailoring the programme to women and children, who were heavily impacted by the disease.

The beauty of the strategy, Dr. Cook added, was that the integrated strategy, as a community development strategy, would have many benefits beyond its immediate objectives.

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