Experts tout cheap ways to bolster public health

Even the poorest countries in the world can improve their overall health by taking simple, inexpensive steps such as providing aspirin to help cut down on heart disease and stroke -- the biggest single killer in developing countries, health experts said yesterday.

Three were released at the start of a four-day global conference outlining the best and worst buys that help or hinder the goal of saving lives from medical issues ranging from cancer and HIV/AIDS to traffic accidents.

"Many of our ministers think of health systems as a bottomless pit that cannot be addressed," said George Alleyne, director emeritus of the Pan American Health Organization and an editor for the Disease Control Priorities Project.

"You do not have to be rich to improve your health, that is an essential message of this book," he said.

He said countries can save large amounts of money simply by using the data collected for what works and what doesn't -- for example, avoiding costly surgery for people with epilepsy and instead providing pills that cost pennies apiece.

Shigeru Omi, regional director for the Western Pacific of the WHO, said the region is saddled with a huge health burden that varies greatly among countries. Japan has a life expectancy of 82 years, compared to Papua New Guinea where it's only 53.

"In the 37 countries and areas that make up our region, 11,000 people die every day due to cardiovascular disease and another 6,500 people die as the result of cancer," he said in a video presentation broadcast at the conference's opening.

"More than 1 million cases of tuberculosis are diagnosed annually in the region every year. Newly emerging infectious diseases, first SARS and now avian influenza, demand that we strengthen our ability to detect and respond to outbreaks at the grass-roots level," he said.

Dean Jamison, a health economics professor at the University of California, San Francisco and a senior editor of the project, said poor countries can make huge improvements in people's lives without spending a lot of money. He said the life expectancy in China increased by 30 years from 1950 to 1980, even though the country's income levels were still low.