A Once In A Generation Opportunity
We must do better at protecting healthcare workers
In May 2019 — well before the first case of COVID-19 — the World Health Organization announced that 2020 would be the International Year of the Nurse and Midwife.
At the announcement, Lord Nigel Crisp — former Chief Executive of the UK’s National Healthcare Service — called this year a “once in a generation opportunity… to really show nurses and midwives how much they are valued — not by empty words, but by effective, decisive action.” His statement has proven prophetic with the onset of COVID-19.
Now, more than ever, we must rise to his charge.
Over the past two weeks, COVID-19 has strained some of the most robust and well-resourced health systems in the world. Nurses, midwives, and other healthcare professionals in 184 countries are working tirelessly to save lives, often at great risk to themselves. In China, over 3000 healthcare workers were infected with the virus and at least 13 died. In Italy, 20 percent of responding healthcare workers have been infected. Already in the US, at least one nurse and one doctor have died from COVID-19, with many more healthcare workers infected.
Such infection rates have been driven higher by global shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE) and limitations to testing capacity. But, tragically, high infection rates among healthcare workers are not unprecedented when we look at previous epidemics, particularly in low-resource settings.
In Peru, incidence rates of tuberculosis are 10–12 times higher among healthcare workers compared to the general public. In Guinea, during the 2014–16 Ebola epidemic, health care workers were 42 times more likely to contract Ebola than non-healthcare workers. Health systems in low-resource settings already face significant and chronic shortages of trained staff, protective and biomedical equipment, and diagnostic tools.
We must do better at protecting healthcare workers globally.
Yes — more PPE. More testing. More contact tracing. And also, more reliable and appropriate infrastructure.
Resilient infrastructure is the backbone of a strong health system. Without reliable and appropriate facilities — without beds, without power to run ventilators, without running water to keep hands clean — the lives of healthcare professionals and all of their patients are at even greater risk, now and in future outbreaks.
Dr. David Walton is the Co-Founder and CEO of Build Health International, a non-profit organization which exists to serve the healthcare needs of the most vulnerable by building high-quality health infrastructure in low-resource settings.
Learn more about BHI’s response to COVID-19 and the open-access infrastructure resources we have available free for organizations and Ministries of Health responding to COVID-19 in low-resource settings.
