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PAN AMERICAN SCHOOL 10TH ANNUAL MODEL UNITED NATIONS February 23 rd, 24 th, and 25 th Natalia Tellez Secretary General Jose Luis Herrera Director General Miranda Silva Crisis Director Valeria Villafranca Subsecretary of Commitees Rafael Paredes Chief of Crisis Paola Froto Subsecretary of Affairs Dear Delegates, Welcome to PASMUN 2017! We are honored to have you participate at our 10th Annual Model United Nations. Our secretariat, chairs and staff have been working to give you one of the best simulations you will ever experience. During these three days you will have the opportunity to deal with international issues which will improve your skills, flourish your leadership, will promote teamwork and will make you have a different way of viewing the world we live in. You will also get to know new people, since this is an event created by students for students. We encourage you to challenge your abilities in all the possible ways before, during and after the event. We hope you give your best in this simulation and take the most advantage of it. This year, since we still have faith in humanity, we are trying to inspire you in order for you to inspire others to be the change! We are beyond excited to have you in our event! Sincerely, Pablo Navarro Subsecretary of Technology 1 Natalia Tellez Secretary General
Committee: World Health Organization Director: Juan Manuel Moderator: Marielly Hoyer Topic A: Global Health and Policies with Focus on the SDGs I. History of the Committee Founded in the 7 th of April of 1948, the World Health Organization (WHO) is in charge of the prevention, promotion and intervention of health internationally. It was created by the United Nations because they wanted to form a health organization. Since then every 7 th of April the world day is celebrated. WHO s main goal is to build a better and healthier future for people all around the world. They help mothers and children survive and thrive to diseases so they can have a good healthy life. Their headquarters are located in Geneva and they are working in the actual day all over the world in 150 countries. Their main areas of work are basically the health systems, the promotion of health through life course, noncommunicable and communicable diseases and preparedness, surveillance and response. WHO is trying to achieve the SDG related to health, which is to Ensure healthy lives and promote wellbeing for all at all ages. They have 13 targets that cover most of their work. Some examples of the targets that they are more focused on are the ones of stopping mortality, curing diseases, stop abuse of substances, find new treatments for current diseases etc. They are now trying to achieve and have achieved some but sill there is some pending to accomplish. II. Statement of the Problem The World Health Organization wants to ensure health for all or almost all people. But even though WHO has achieved fewer deaths and less diseases all over the world, there are still many people who are affected because of many diseases. This is an actual world issue because if we ignore this then more and more people will be seen affected, causing a big global issue that would be harder to solve. For example, it has been recorded recently that the main mortal disease that teenagers have are AIDS, something that 20 years ago was not a very big deal. This tells us that some diseases that may not be seen 2
as very common, years later they can become very common and harmful. That is why the World Health Organization is fully aware of this and has as a main objective that is to achieve the 3rd Sustainable Development Goal. This goal is mainly focused on achieving a healthy life for people of all ages and especially children. To achieve this, the UN has put WHO in charge of this, as well as many other organizations, like the UNAIDS, the UNFPA, the ILO etc. III. Topic Information A) History of the topic The Sustainable Development Goals have as an objective to achieve 8 main goals. The third one is the one related to health and the one that WHO is mainly concerned about. This goal states that they need to Ensure healthy lives and promote wellbeing for all at all ages. There has been some progress over the past 20 years in relation to the SDGs. For example, 17,000 fewer children die each day than in 1990 and there is also 50 percent less maternal mortality than in 1990. Also HIV infections of people have decreased by 38 percent and child HIV infections have decreased by 58 percent since 2001. Also tuberculosis mortality has decreased by 45 percent and the prevalence rate by 41 percent. But still this is an alarming issue because there are many children that still die before being 5 years old, about six million per year and mostly occur in sub-saharan Africa and Southern Asia. Also it has been recorded that AIDS are the main cause of death among teenagers and there are 2.1 million teenagers that are living now with HIV. This tells us that this issue is still around us and that we need to find a good solution for this. B) Current Issues WHO has been dedicating to solve all the issues related to global health and even though it has solved many issues there are still some current problems that WHO has found difficult to solve and finish for example completely end diseases and prevent them to spread, especially AIDS, that are now, according to the United Nations, the major disease in teenagers. Also another current issue related to health is children that have been seen affected by many diseases that they cannot survive and pass the 5 years. Also one global health issue that is affecting very much is cancer, which is a condition in which cells divide uncontrollably. This has caused many deaths since there is not a good cure for that, 3
instead they would put you into radiation, and which will only make you live more years but finally still die. Another problem is that there was a global shortage of 7.2 million doctors in 2015, this means that the amount of doctors has been decreasing, leading us to have fewer doctors to take care of people and therefore more death rates. This and many more are examples current problems we are facing because of this issue. This issue has affected a lot our world because they have made death rates increase and diseases more common in our society. This is something we need to analyze and try to solve disease issues in a fast but mainly effective way for our world. It is clear that the death rates because of diseases have significantly decreased since 1990 but this doesn't mean it is over, we still need to fight and put dedication on making a healthy world with fewer death rates and less people infected. C) United Nations Actions The United Nations in order to solve global health issues, they have created the organizations focused on this issue like the Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS); the work of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in support of reproductive, adolescent and maternal health; and the health-related activities of the United Nations Children s Fund (UNICEF). The purpose of this committee is to find the causes of the diseases so then they can find a solution to this issue. Other minor members of the UN that play a key role in promoting global health are the International Labor Organization (ILO), the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). By creating these organizations, the United Nations hopes they can succeed in increasing global health and eventually in the end finally accomplish the third goal of the SDGs. IV. Conclusion We can say as a conclusion that there has been a significant advance in the health issues because compared to 1990, child mortality and some diseases have decreased in a significant way. However this does not mean that it is completely solved, we still have to get to more solutions before the issue gets bigger and more people start to get more 4
diseases, because there has been more bad things going like the increase of VIH infected people and also the AIDS that now are the major disease that occur in teenagers. So my solutions would be to advertise people about the prevention of foods that can damage their health. Also by making conferences about the use of protection when having sexual relations so they use them and do not get VIH or any other virus that is transmitted sexually and can damage the health of many people. Also to pressure people working at hospitals by giving them money so they can find solutions to diseases and then more people get cured from diseases faster. In this ways, we can solve the actual health issues in our world and eventually accomplish the third goal of the SDGs. By accomplishing it, we can assure that our future and our children are in very good hands, with health and without any harmful diseases. We can assure our future, we can live in a world with fewer diseases, we can live healthy, and we only need to make a little effort to succeed and to finally accomplish the third goal, leading us to complete all SDGs. V. Essential Questions 1. Who is mainly affected by this issue? 2. What is one solution for this issue? 3. Which countries are mainly affected? 4. What is the main cause of this issue? 5. How can this issue affect children? 6. How is the UN contributing to solve this issue? 7. Do you have any backup plan? 8. What is your opinion about this issue? VI. Bibliography Who Int recovered from www.who.int/about/en/ WHO INTrecovered from www.who.int/sustaniable-development-goals/targets/en/ UN recovered from www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/health/ 5
Intra Health recovered from www.intrahealth.org/blog/top-10-global-health-issueswatch-2015#.wclcldlhdiu UN recovered from www.un.org/en/globalissues/health/ Humanosphere recovered from www.humanosphere.org/globalhealth/2016/01/guest-post-10-global-health-issues-to-follow-in-2016/ 6