Mind the GAPPD: Integrating WASH with Other Sectors to End Preventable Childhood Deaths

This blog post is also posted on the WASH Advocates website.

Today’s release of the Integrated Global Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Pneumonia and Diarrhea (GAPPD), developed by the World Health Organization (WHO) and UNICEF, represents the first-ever simultaneous effort to protect children from pneumonia and diarrhea, which take the lives of almost two million children a year. The Global Action Plan is based on the most recent data and evidence collected in a special series published in The Lancet today.

The goal is ambitious but achievable: to end preventable childhood deaths due to pneumonia and diarrhea by 2025. At the launch today in Washington, DC, special emphasis was placed on the fact that the interventions exist to prevent and control these diseases, but coverage of these interventions is poor, especially in the most marginalized populations and the poorest of the poor. Scale-up and collaboration of all efforts surrounding pneumonia and diarrhea is necessary to reach this goal by 2025.

Samira Aboubaker of WHO noted, “The message is clear: we do not want a new plan. We want the existing plan to reflect the priorities of [all the sectors], epidemiology, birthing, etc. Therefore, it is an opportunity to look at the existing plan and identify the missing pieces. The water and sanitation group has to be part of our plan. Clearly we’ve seen we have to protect,prevent, and treat pneumonia and diarrhea, and that needs to be reflected in this plan.”

The GAPPD strategy seeks to establish good health practice from birth, preventing children from becoming ill from pneumonia and diarrhea, and treating children who are ill from pneumonia and diarrhea with appropriate treatment. Promoting handwashing and improving water supply, sanitation, and hygiene are among the interventions that have been proven to be effective in fighting these killers of young children, in addition to exclusive breastfeeding, vaccines, disease case management, oral rehydration salts, demand creation activities for behavior change, and reduction of household air pollution.

The key messages of GAPPD are:

1. Working together, we can end preventable deaths of young children around the world from two of the leading child killers, pneumonia and diarrhea.
2. The integrated Global Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Pneumonia and Diarrhea (GAPPD) from WHO and UNICEF goes to the heart of the challenge: recognizing that prevention and control of pneumonia and diarrhea cannot be adequately dealt with separately but only through integrated programs.
3. Without these urgent accelerated and coordinated efforts, each year more than two million of the world’s most vulnerable children will continue to die from these two diseases. We must close this equity gap.
4. Successfully reducing pneumonia and diarrhea deaths requires engagement by a wide range of actors and sectors, and first and foremost, it requires national political will.
5. These diseases must be addressed if we are to move the needle significantly in achieving the Millennium Development Goal to save the lives of children under the age of five (MDG4), as well as successful implementation of the UN Global Strategy for Women’s and Children’s Health, and the Promise Renewed commitment to child survival.

We all have a role to play in ending preventable child deaths, and we must work together to achieve this ambitious and worthy goal.