The World Health Day is marked on 7th April every year. It was initiated in 1948 at the First Health Assembly and took effect in 1950. It’s held to mark the founding of the World Health Organization.
This year’s theme seeks to build and ensure that health is not just a preserve of the rich, but a basic human right. Over the past 50 years, World Health Day has brought to light important health issues such as childcare, mental and maternal health, climate change among others.
Celebrations are marked by activities that extend beyond the day itself that serves as an opportunity to focus worldwide attention on these important aspects of global health.
The COVID-19 pandemic has unfortunately left more people facing the loss of livelihoods, stress, strained relationships which sometimes lead to mental health complications and poverty.
This year, the World Health Organization is calling on all leaders to live up to the pledges they made when they agreed to the Sustainable Development Goals in 2015 and to commit to concrete steps to advance the health of all people.
To commemorate World Health Day, here are some interesting facts:
- More people have access to a mobile phone than a toilet
- Americans spend more on Halloween than the world spends on Malaria in a year
- Only 28% of top health officials at the WHO are women
- WHO reports 35.6 per cent of women have been subjected to physical or sexual violence
- Diarrhoea kills 2,195 children every day – more than AIDS, Malaria, and Measles combined
