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WORLD HEALTH ORGANISATION MONDIALE ORGANIZATION DE LA SANTÉ FIFTEENTH WORLD HEALTH ASSEMBLY А15/Р8&В/3 Part I У 13 April 1962 Provisional agenda item 2.11 ORIGINAL: ENGLISH SECOND REPORT ON THE WORLD КЕАLTH SITUATION (Part I) In accordance with resolution WHA11.38,1 the Director -General has the honour to submit to the Fifteenth World Health Assembly the Second Report on the World Health Situation. This Report is presented in two separate parts, Part I comprising six chapters of general survey and Part II (Chapter 7) on individual country reviews. As in the case of the First Report on the World Health Situation, this Report is presented as a mimeographed document. A final version of the Report will be prepared for publication after the Assembly. , ✓ ���. ) � ДVk. ; 1 Handbook of Resolutions and Decisions, 6th ed., p. 132 W O R L D H E A L T H ORGANISATION MONDIALE ORGANIZATION DE LA SANTÉ SECOND REPORT ON THE WORLD HEALTH SITUATION 1957 - 1960 PART I INTRODUCTION Geneva 1962 WORLD HEALTH ORGANISATION MONDIALE ORGANIZATION DE LA SANTE SECOND REPORT ON THE WORLD HEALTH SITUATION 1957 - 1960 Part I INTRODUCTION мно/РА/4о .62 -1- CHAPTER I The launching of the First Report on the World Health Situation was by any standard of values a singular event. The Report, laboriously and yet devotedly compiled by many hands, was in itself unique. It represented the initial attempt, successfully accomplished, to gather together from all the countries of the world information regarding their activities and affairs in the realm of health. The routine information which each country was asked to provide was expected to conform in the main to a certain presentational pattern, but there was no dearth of opportunity for the making of more general or supplementary comments and observations. It was in fact possible for the government of any country, reflecting upon its responsibilities, difficulties and achievements to give its own account of itself - not in self - justification or commendation- but simply as a contribution to the common stock of knowledge and to the widening and extending pool of experience in health administration. That information collected, collated, compiled and analysed, became through a process of metamorphosis the First Report on the World Health Situation. As such it provided another unique opportunity - the opportunity for comparison over a world -wide field. Contrasts and comparisons have been beneficial and productive in that they have enabled a country to read and learn how some other territory, faced with the same health problems, has found the appropriate solution and mastered them. They have also been a stimulus to emulation. From these exchanges of knowledge of common difficulties, of ideas, of know -how and of encouragement, it has become possible to build more surely for the future and to appreciate once again the boon of international collaboration. One further function was subserved by the First Report. It made available not only to those concerned in the daily round of health administration, but to the probing and analytical minds of students, teachers and research workers a compendious statement of the world's health. For the latter group in particular it meant that they had access to a vast corpus of information, which when submitted to their dispassionate study, and after appropriate digestion, could suggest to their minds remedies for defects and deficiencies still existing, and new approaches to the elimination of old evils. As a compendium of information, unique in its conception, outstanding in its presentation of facts, and uncannily cognisant of future trends and tendencies the First Report on the World Health Situation took its place alongside those other documents which emanate from the United Nations and the World Health Organization, and constitute an invaluable International Library of Reference. The tasks of the pioneers are hard, but no less difficult at times are those of their successors. Not only is there the need to achieve the same end, but there is also an expectation - often unfulfilled - that those who follow will improve upon the labours of their predecessors. The First Report on the World Health Situation, because of its novelty and uniqueness, because of the more detailed picture it was able to paint of the geographical, social and economic circumstances which lie in the background of all health activities, because of the elegance and clarity of the lessons which it was able to draw in its introductory synthesis, has found unquestioning acceptance as one of the classical documents of public health. -2- Repetition of such an achievement is impossible, but there are other reasons which determine a more pedestrian approach. The world health situation report, having established itself, places upon its producers the responsibility for creating a more permanent and continuing framework of presentation, which will facilitate comparison between the pioneering protocol and the second and subsequent reports in the series. There are certain items of information which must appear repetitively in every report. They are not invested with any dramatic appeal; they are in fact rather drab and monotonous extracts from the life-and.-death ledgers of the country, but they must be given a uniformity of presentation so that future users of the reports can compare item with item and table with table. And there is this further difference. Certain features which gave to the First Report a special character, both refreshing and stimulating, are not to be perpetuated. Thus, for example, the vivid description of a country's geography, constitution, educational facilities, social and economic circumstances, and industrial development - the whole providing a background of reference and allusion which was for the readers of the First Report a fascinating source of illuminative information - has not been reproduced, at least for this occasion. It can be found in the First Report or in other official and non -official books of reference. In the present report a background vignette of this kind will only be drawn where, as in the case of some country recently attaining independence it has not hitherto been provided or has been merged in some description of grouped colonial territories. Again, in those sections of the country reviews where the organization and administration of the health services are described, it has been considered advisable to refer back to the detailed descriptions in the First Report, rather than to embark upon a somewhat otiose re-statement cf the original presentation. Obviously where variations and developments have occurred, they are reported, and even in the more highly organized countries it is remarkable how the wind of change has been active in fields which traditionally have been regarded as sacrosanct. It will perhaps be helpful to look back upon the historical background of the world health situation reports, and to remind ourselves of their genesis. The relevant references are to be found in Articles 61 and 62 of the Constitution of the World Health Organization, which read as follows: Article 61 - Each Member shall report annually to the Organization on the action taken and progress achieved in improving the health of its people. Article 62 - Each Member shall report annually on the action taken with respect to recommendations made to it by the Organization and with respect to conventions, agreements and regulations. Under the inspiration of these Articles, there was early in the history of the Organization a suggestion that an International Health Year Book should be prepared and published. This proposal, though never explicitly abandoned, was shelved in 1952, largely, it would appear, because of the inevitable delay in producing a summary which would be both useful and contemporary. Meanwhile, however, the obligations accepted by Member States under Articles 61 and 62 were not being met, at any rate in full. It may be that by many people the steadily lengthening line of Annual Reports of the Director- General had come to be regarded as a valuable commentary on World Health, whereas in substance they were but the record of the work of the Organization. Never- theless, the comprehensiveness and freshness of those reports, and their obvious awareness of many national trends, movements and achievements might be held to be a sufficient explanation of that misapprehension. However, in 1955 the Director - General brought to the notice of the Executive Board the expressed views of the Economic and Social Council and of the General Assembly of the United Nations as to the need for an assessment of the health situation in the world, and of the fact that such assessments were essential to the fulfilment of the Organization's other functions. He was invited to submit a study of the matter to the Eighth World Health Assembly. In the event it was the Ninth World Health Assembly which in May 1956 authorized the preparation of a report on the world health situation covering as far as possible the years 1954 to 1956; and recommended the broad lines on which it should be compiled. It further requested that this first report should be available for the Eleventh World Health Assembly. The present report derives from a resolution of the Eleventh Assembly which at its meeting in Minneapolis in June 1958, received the first report, and requested that a second report should be prepared for the period 1957 to 1960, and presented to the Fifteenth Assembly in 1962. Reverting to the First Report, the Executive Board in February 1956 suggested that as a basis for its preparation, those members of the Organization who were also members of the Pan American Sanitary Organization should follow the relevant portions of the questionnaire already in use in that milieu. As to the others, it was suggested that instead of completing a questionnaire they should formulate their replies in accordance with a list of headings of "Information requested ", making such adjustments as might be necessary in the process.