Dr Margaret Chan, Director-General of the World Health Organization
08 December 2008 | Geneva
Address to 14th session of the Joint Action Forum of the African Programme for Onchocerciasis Control (APOC)
Quotation from Dr Margaret Chan's speech, Director-General of the World Health Organization.
"The successes of onchocerciasis control in Africa has increased accessibility to fertile land and agricultural productivity, reduction of poverty, improved health status and has removed two significant public-health problems, namely onchocercal blindness and skin diseases
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Africa needs to maintain the gains made in controlling onchocerciasis and to continue to reduce the impact of the disease as a pressing public-health problem and an impediment to social and economic advances."