Activities and Issues of the World Health Organization (WHO) Report

This report provides a comprehensive overview of the activities and challenges faced by the World Health Organization (WHO), with a specific focus on refugee and migrant health. It examines the global impact of migration on health, including the prevalence of communicable and non-communicable diseases, maternal health issues, and the socioeconomic challenges faced by host countries. The report reviews the WHO's initiatives and actions to address these issues, such as the development of health programs, technical assistance, research, and the establishment of strategic plans. It highlights the importance of international cooperation, reducing health inequalities, and strengthening health systems to improve the health outcomes of migrants and refugees. The conclusion emphasizes the ongoing efforts of the WHO and the need for continued support and resources to effectively address the complex health challenges associated with migration and displacement.

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Activities and issues of the World Health Organization (WHO)

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Table of Contents
Abstract............................................................................................................................................3
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Review of Related Literature...........................................................................................................3
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................8
References......................................................................................................................................10

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Abstract
The paper will focus on the global issue faced by World health organisation (WHO). It will
review the global presence of the issue and its health impacts along with the steps/actions taken
by WHO to overcome the challenges.
Introduction
In the era of economically globalised countries and developing nations the countries are facing
various challenges such as poverty, pollution, climate change and other problems related to
health and migration which is becoming a challenge that are affects the international relations.
There is need to collaborate and the global challenges identified by WHO are needed to be
overcome through the combined efforts of the nations and organizations that are working
together. There is also a situation of conflicts and wars that are also affecting the international
relations so it is a challenge for World Health Organisation (WHO) to deal with the issues with
the availability of limited resources. This literature review will focus on one such challenge that
is Refugee and migrant health along with the steps that are taken globally to overcome it.
Review of Related Literature
According to Johnson, (2017) immigration/migration is considered to be a global issue for most
of the countries. Many of the counties welcomed most of the refugees and have stretched their
capacity to absorb as per the limits but this has become a challenge for the nations and affecting
the international relations of the countries. In the words of Schilling, et al., (2017) the situation of
wars and geographical situation has resulted to a situation of migration. There is an increase in

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the number of migrants in Europe and the number of migrants has reached 244 millions in 2015
which is almost 3% of the world population. There were 1.9 million refugees that were from
non-member countries in the European Union. WHO has identified refugees and migrants as
global issue and there are issues of common health problems. Migrants are considered to be the
population that moves to other country due to worst economic condition, seek of employment of
any other reason and might move to another country, return back or remain in the home country.
On the other side, refugee are the person which are having a situation of fear due to religion
issue, terrorism, poverty, war or other issue that motivates to move from the home country to
host country to protect or provide protection from the guest country. The issues of the health and
food are similar to the general population of the world. The most common issues identified with
the migrants and refugees are accidental injuries, burns, hypothermia, gastrointestinal illness,
pregnancy and delivery related complications (UNHCR 2015). In addition to this, female
refugees face issues of maternal, child health, sexual and reproductive health. Violence is
identified as common problem with the migrants and the key issue the access to providers and
health care systems. There are 31000 people identified to have died or gone missing at the sea at
the time of crossing the Mediterranean Sea in the fists 10 months of 2015. These migrations have
resulted to several chronic diseases, prevalence of HIV infection is generally low in North Africa
and Middle East but due to migration of population has resulted to increased issue 40% in most
northern European countries where as the proportion is 20-40% in Western Europe (Van Biesen,
et al., 2018). WHO also identified that besides a decline in the past decade still migrants
constitute of 35% new HIV cases in European Union and European Economic Area.
According to Hargreaves, et al., (2018) there are number of obstacles faced in treatment and
providing health services due to culturally sensitive health system. It is common problem of

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communication, access to health services and food and shelter at the relocation. In the words of
Lajcak, (2018) about one of 113 people globally were seeker, migrant and more than half of the
refugee population was under the age of 18. The drastic level of the issues can be identified with
183 per thousand are the inhabitants hosted by Lebanon. 86% of the developing regions host the
world’s refugees which is highest figure in past two decades and even the least developed
countries asylum to 4.2 million refugees that is almost 26% of the country population. A report
issues by UNHCR (2015), depicts that Turkey, Pakistan and Lebanon are the countries that most
number of refugees worldwide with 2.5, 1.6 and 1.1 million refugees in year 2015 respectively.
This has resulted to the challenge of economic, social and health to the host countries. The
developing countries are facing challenge of dealing with the issues of poverty, health and
employment and due to the increased migration from the neighbouring countries results to
affects the international relation which creates a tense situation that limits trade, foreign
exchange and tourism of the country.
UNHCR, (2015) reports that migration has also resulted to the occurrence of several non-
communicable health issues and diseases in the residents such as diabetes, cancer, chronic lung
disease, cardiovascular disease and hypertension other has results to affect low and middle
income countries as high as 25-35%. The issue related to NCDs is more vulnerable due to the
prevalent condition during the travel. The diseases are needed to taken care of as they require
provision of long time care and sometimes for entire life. There is also common need to have
regular treatment and medication, it also limits the functioning of the body, daily activity, and
even reduce life expectancy. This necessitates coordination of provision of care, follow up and
palliative care (United Nations, 2016). The other challenges that leads to impact the health of the
residents and the population migrated are sexual and reproductive health. In the past 20 years,

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there is rise in sexually transmitted diseases that is a matter of concern for European Region due
to migration. WHO has identified female genital mutilation as a topical issue in countries like
United Kingdom, Belgium, Sweden and Norway there were several other counties that
approached WHO to address the issue. The challenge of refugees and migration is at such an
extent that a proportion of refugee and migrant population remain undiagnosed NCDs includes
diabetes and cardiovascular disease. The criticalness of the issues arises at the time of pregnancy
and results to maternal morbidity and might result to death (UNHCR, 2015). The issue of late
diagnose, and antenatal care sometimes leads to life threatening for mothers, women and babies.
WHO analysed that maternal health is targeted to be ready for improvement of the health and
status of the migrants and refugees. For this purpose, the targeted group will be considered under
WHO European Sexual and Reproductive Health Action Plan.
Actions to overcome the issues of migration and their health
WHO European Region (2018) reported that there is need to improve the hosting through a long
term integration of the various goals and designing, delivering the facilities such as healthcare,
education, social services and skill training. It is needed that UNHCR must incorporate towns
and cities with a specified refugee population for testing and development of new approaches. It
is also needed to encourage U.N. member’s countries to engage in meaningful collaboration
along with the municipal authorities for enhancing the flow of technical expertise and resources
to cities and towns. It is also required to develop a framework that will integrate refugees directly
from cities.
It is also needed that the countries facing the challenge of continuous traffic of migrants need to
improve coordination and cooperation with the neighbours. There is also a need to reduce

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socioeconomic and health inequalities that drives consistent increasing population to migrate.
There are several global actions that were needed to be taken by all UN member states through
closer cooperation and responsibility sharing.
WHO European Region (2018) depicts a number of initiatives that were taken by WHO in
context to overcome the issue under 2030 agenda and sustainable goals. There is an introduction
of health and support program for strengthening of the health sector capacity and betterment of
the services to migrant and refugee health. The programme initiates support through four pillars
namely technical assistance, research and training, health information, partnership building and
advocacy and communication (Bauder, 2015). It is and collaborative inter-country approach for
the improvement of migrant health through inculcation of cross country policy dialogue and
encouraging health interventions. It will cover the migration routes to promote health of refugees
and protection of public health of the relocated country.
WHO is also applying an innovative tool kit developed in the joint public health and its
assessment mission conducted in several countries like Greece, Hungary, Italy, and Spain and so
on for the analysis of the countries to large scale migration; it is strict need to establish minimum
standards for responding to refugees needs. WHO continues to access the requirements of
refugees that have resulted to build a model that will provide integrated support includes Syrian
medical professions, financial and technical support for outbreak response and establishment of
early warning systems along with immunisation campaigns, supply of medical equipments and
drugs. It is also needed to disseminate material information to refugees (Heeren, et al., 2014).
In the words of WHO European Region, (2018) it is required to establish strategic and action
plan which will work on nine priority area. Establishing a framework for collaborative action is

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the first strategic area followed by advocating for the right to health of the migrants and refuges
as second area. The third area is addressing the social determinants of health followed by
achievement of public health preparedness and ensures effective response. It is also needed to
strengthen the health system and its resilience that will lead to prevention from communicable
diseases. Prevention and reduction of risks arise due to non-communicable diseases and
assurance of ethical and effective health assessment is the strategic areas of focus (WHO, 2018).
It is also needed to maintain record of the information and effective communication for long
term achievement of the goals.
Conclusion
It can be concluded that WHO is putting continuous efforts to improve the condition of the
migrants and refugees in European countries facing challenge to deal with the issue that is also
affecting the international relations. This issue is negatively impacting the trade and relations
among the countries which is a matter of concern. It is also identified that there are several
health consequences arise due to migration and refugee which leads to communicable and non-
communicable diseases and certain chronic diseases to the host country.
The identified challenges that occur due to increased migration are extra burden on economy,
lack of basis and critical care, and failure to deal with the overburdened population that lead to
failure to provide basic needs such as shelter, food and medical support. This has resulted to an
increase in the health issues and several deaths just because of delay or non availability of the
timely health facilities.
There were several programmes and summits that were organised to overcome the challenges but
the problem is at such an extent that it will take decades to up bring the status of the migrants and

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refugees. It is recommended that there is need to establish help centre at the peak migration
locations to provide food and shelter and WHO is required to ensure timely availability of
primary and critical health facility to the migrants in effective manner.

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References
Bauder, H. (2015). The international mobility of academics: A labour market
perspective, International Migration, 53(1), 83-96.
Hargreaves, S., Rustage, K., Nellums, L. B., Powis, J., Milburn, J., Severoni, S., ... & Friedland,
J. S. (2018). What Constitutes an Effective and Efficient Package of Services for the
Prevention, Diagnosis, Treatment and Care of Tuberculosis among Refugees and
Migrants in the WHO European Region?. Copenhagen: World Health Organization.
Heeren, M., Wittmann, L., Ehlert, U., Schnyder, U., Maier, T., & Müller, J. (2014).
Psychopathology and resident status–comparing asylum seekers, refugees, illegal
migrants, labor migrants, and residents. Comprehensive psychiatry, 55(4), 818-825.
Johnson, H. (2017). Immigration and International Relations. Retrieved from:
http://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199756223/obo-
9780199756223-0204.xml#obo-9780199756223-0204-div1-0012
Lajcak, M. (2018). Why we need a global understanding of migration. Retrieved from:
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/01/global-migration-can-be-a-success/
Schilling, T., Rauscher, S., Menzel, C., Reichenauer, S., Müller-Schilling, M., Schmid, S., &
Selgrad, M. (2017). Migrants and refugees in Europe: challenges, experiences and
contributions. Visceral medicine, 33(4), 295-300.
UNHCR (2015). Global Trends Forced Displacement In 2015. Retrieved from:
http://www.unhcr.org/576408cd7.pdf

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United Nations (2016). Migration. Retrieved from:
http://www.un.org/en/sections/issues-depth/migration/index.html
Van Biesen, W., Vanholder, R., Ernandez, T., Drewniak, D., & Luyckx, V. (2018). Caring for
Migrants and Refugees With End-Stage Kidney Disease in Europe. American Journal of
Kidney Diseases, 71(5), 701-709.
WHO (2018). Migration and health: key issues. Retrieved from:
http://www.euro.who.int/en/health-topics/health-determinants/migration-and-health/
migrant-health-in-the-european-region/migration-and-health-key-issues
WHO European Region (2018). Health of refugees and migrants. Retrieved from:
http://www.who.int/migrants/publications/EURO-Practices.pdf