Margaret Chan
Margaret Chan
Margaret Chan Fung Fu-chun, OBE, JPis a Hong Kong Chinese and Canadian physician, who serves as the Director-General of the World Health Organizationfor 2006–17. Chan was elected by the Executive Board of WHO on 8 November 2006, and was endorsed in a special meeting of the World Health Assembly on the following day. Chan has previously served as Director of Health in the Hong Kong Government, representative of the WHO Director-General for Pandemic Influenza and WHO Assistant Director-General for Communicable...
NationalityChinese
ProfessionPublic Servant
CountryChina
Influenza pandemics must be taken seriously, precisely because of their capacity to spread rapidly to every country in the world.
The international community should treat this as a window of opportunity to ramp up preparedness and response.
This change to a higher phase of alert is a signal to governments, to ministries of health and other ministries, to the pharmaceutical industry and the business community that certain actions now should be undertaken with increased urgency and at an accelerated pace.
The unique nature about the influenza virus is its great potential for changes, for mutation.
The WHO is the lead agency in health in the United Nations system, and clearly we have very important functions to play.
Antimicrobial resistance is on the rise in Europe and elsewhere in the world. We are losing our first-line antimicrobials. Replacement treatments are more costly, more toxic, need much longer durations of treatment, and may require treatment in intensive care units.
What amazes me most is that the media and I have fostered a close relationship.
I am personally overseeing changes that include the establishment of a global health emergency workforce.
When you're dealing with new and emerging diseases, you have no idea and you can't predict in advance what would happen.
The Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness, and the related Accra Agenda for Action, are useful policy instruments that set out the mutual responsibilities of donors and recipient countries.
All experts on WHO advisory groups for developing norms, standards and guidelines are required to disclose interests regarding the advisory committee's area of work. If a declared interest is potentially significant, then the expert is either excluded from the meeting or given a restricted role.
A severe disease that transmits easily will leave very little international surge capacity as most countries will need their own staff and resources to combat the outbreak in their territories.
At a time of multiple calamities in the world, we cannot allow the loss of essential antimicrobials, essential cures for many millions of people, to become the next global crisis.
Tobacco is the only industry that produces products to make huge profits and at the same time damage the health and kill their consumers.