By Barb Nash
The United States has pulled out of the World Health Organization (WHO) and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has turned the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) into a shell of its former self. So what? As a healthcare professional I am angry, disgusted, and afraid.
While individuals are sadly being killed on the streets of America, these reckless actions have the potential to kill large numbers of us more efficiently, without the need for paid manpower. Organisms can be just as deadly as bullets.
For decades the U.S., a founding member of WHO, led the charge against the ravages of disease with remarkable success. Together with our WHO partners, the disease of smallpox was successfully eradicated from the face of the earth. Progress against many other public health threats including polio, HIV, Ebola, influenza, tuberculosis, malaria, neglected tropical diseases, antimicrobial resistance, food safety, and much more is now at risk.
For years, the USAID program worked tirelessly to add polio to the list of eradicated diseases. There is currently no “wild” polio virus in the Americas, but only in CDC- and the National Authority for Containment-certified, and highly regulated, laboratories and vaccine manufacturing sites. But that victory could rapidly change as there is “wild” polio in other parts of the world. In Afghanistan and Pakistan and sub-Saharan African countries it is endemic and circulating in the community, because healthcare workers have difficulty gaining access to unvaccinated populations.
With the current anti-vaccine movement, recent risky changes in the recommended vaccine schedule, and Kennedy’s deliberate erosion of trust in the CDC’s expertise, we are now at risk for exposure to a multitude of diseases, including polio. Deadly diseases are only a plane ride away.
Have we so quickly forgotten how COVID 19 arrived on our western shore in January 2020 and how many people died?
The WHO, founded in 1948, and the CDC, founded in 1946, have been the “Gold Standard” for healthcare professionals. We managed to develop vaccines and, with herd immunity, prevent many illnesses and save lives. Many healthcare providers, and even non-medical citizens, feel we can no longer rely on our usual sources of evidence-based information. A number of our CDC experts have been fired and others have sought refuge in foreign countries who welcome their expertise.
We have been watching in upstate South Carolina what happens when a vaccine-preventable disease drops below herd immunity levels. (South Carolina used to be at 95%, mainly because of public school requirements.) Fortunately, the death rate from measles is low in otherwise healthy individuals. Not zero, but low.
What if another disease with a much higher mortality rate arrives on our shores and we do not have the WHO connections or a viable CDC? What if funding to the CDC continues to be cut? What if vaccines are no longer mandatory and insurers decide to no longer pay for them? What if our herd immunity percentage continues to drop?
There may not be a need for ICE or federal agents to roam our streets indiscriminately killing people. The administration just has to continue to sit on its hands and watch as we succumb to vaccine preventable diseases, both foreign and domestic.
Barb Nash, who lives in Beaufort, spent her career as a nurse and an educator. She is the President of the North of the Broad Democratic Club.
