Pneumonia Day
Pneumonia is the single biggest infectious killer of adults and children – claiming the lives of 2.5 million, including 672,000 children, in 2019.
Why is Pneumonia Day important
Oxygen access has been a long-neglected element of health system planning, despite being an essential treatment for a range of diseases. The COVID-19 pandemic has spotlighted the role of medical oxygen as a life-saving therapy for patients struggling to breathe. This World Pneumonia Day, we are calling on governments and other stakeholders to ensure that the massive effort to control the pandemic contributes to reducing ‘all-cause respiratory infections and deaths among both children and adults for the long term.
How to observe Pneumonia Day
- Raise awareness about pneumonia, the world’s leading infectious killer of children under the age of 5
- Promote interventions to protect against, prevent, and treat pneumonia and highlight proven approaches and solutions in need of additional resources and attention
- Generate action, including continued donor investment, to combat pneumonia and other common, yet sometimes deadly, childhood diseases
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What is pneumonia?
Pneumonia is an infectious disease that causes infection in one or both lungs. It can be serious and life-threatening. Due to an infection, inflammation is caused in the air sacs of the lungs known as alveoli. The air sacs may fill with fluid or puss causes cough, fever, chills, and difficulty in breathing. Various organisms are responsible for causing pneumonia including bacteria, viruses, and fungi.
Let us tell you that it can be serious for infants below the age of 5 and for older people more than 65 age and those who have health-related issues and a weak immune system.
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Resources
- Leveraging the COVID-19 response to end preventable child deaths from pneumonia, The Lancet
- World Pneumonia Day during a global pneumonia pandemic, American Journal of Physiology
- What does SARS-CoV-2 mean for global pneumonia prevention, diagnosis and treatment, CHEST
- Dismantling at a Single Stroke the Achievements of 20 Years in the Fight Against Pneumonia, El Pais
- How to Save kids from the pandemic fallout, POLITICO
- Covid-19 has turned the spotlight on the uneven provision of oxygen—a stark health inequity, BMJ
- PATH Markets Matter campaign assets
- Oxygen Call to Action video, Assist International
- CHAI & MCRI 100andChange video
- CHAI Ethiopia video
- IVAC: Impact of childhood pneumonia on families in Nepal video
- Every Step Counts videos
- Access Challenge/One By One 2030: UHC is Oxygen Provision
- UNICEF Pneumonia Explainer
- Resource Library
Reference Sites
- UN and other international NGO
- Non-Profits website for the observance
- PAHO