During my nearly five years as director-general of WHO, high-level policymakers have increasingly recognized that health is central to sustainable development.
The development of the food industry for both domestic and export markets relies on a regulatory framework that both protects the consumer and assures fair trading practices in food.
The dual scourge of hunger and malnutrition will be truly vanquished not only when granaries are full, but also when people’s basic health needs are met and women are given their rightful role in societies.
More than ever before, there is a global understanding that long-term social, economic, and environmental development would be impossible without healthy families, communities, and countries.
The launch of the report coincides with the initiation by WHO of the global strategy for the prevention and control of osteoporosis, and I think a good partnership could be established in our common efforts to prevent osteoporosis.
Music is something I must do, business is something I need to do, and Africa is something I have to do. That’s the way it breaks down in my life.
An important lever for sustained action in tackling poverty and reducing hunger is money.
Such lifestyle factors such as cigarette smoking, excessive alcohol consumption, little physical activity and low dietary calcium intake are risk factors for osteoporosis as well as for many other non-communicable diseases.
The climate challenge illustrates how we have to change. The developing countries need more support and opportunities to develop and use clean energy. Because if the current situation continues, then the world will not be able to handle this burden.
Today osteoporosis affects more than 75 million people in the United States, Europe and Japan and causes more than 2.3 million fractures in the USA and Europe alone.
The diagnosis is clear, the science in unequivocal-it’s completely immoral, even, to question now, on the basis of what we know, the reports that are out, to question the issue and to question whether we need to move forward at a much stronger pace as humankind to address the issues.
I do not know of any environmental group in any country that does not view its government as an adversary.
The burden of disease falls on the poor.
Since the reduction of risk factors is the scientific basis for primary prevention, the World Health Organization promotes the development of an integrated strategy for prevention of several diseases, rather than focusing on individual ones.
Let me first say that I don’t think the millennium target of cutting global poverty in half is an impossible or abstract target. I think it is a real and achievable goal.
Cancers of all types among women are increasing.
Women’s health is one of WHO’s highest priorities.
When public and private sectors combine intellectual and other resources, more can be achieved.
Cardiovascular diseases are the leading cause of death in women.
Osteoporosis, as the third threat, is particularly attributable to women’s physiology.
There is a very close connection between being a doctor and a politician. The doctor tries to prevent illness, then tries to treat it if it comes. It’s exactly the same as what you try to do as a politician, but with regard to society.