Experts call for global action to tackle life-threatening "hidden" disease

LONDON, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- A global call for action was made Tuesday to help prevent fungal diseases that affect a billion people a year, killing 1.5 million.

Experts from the University of Manchester have co-ordinated the first ever series of medical articles of their kind in the prestigious journal The Lancet Infectious Diseases.

The series gives new insights into the breadth of fungal diseases and a call to action to world health bodies to prevent millions of infections each year.

Professor David Denning from the University of Manchester, told Xinhua: "Fungal diseases are killing over 1.5 million a year, or to put it another way more than 3,000 every day. This is three times the number of deaths caused in the world by malaria. Fungal diseases affect over a billion people a year, but they are one of the most neglected topics by public health authorities. However, most deaths from fungal diseases are avoidable."

The reports show that most serious fungal infections are ['hidden', occurring as a consequence of other health problems such as asthma, AIDS, cancer, organ transplant and corticosteroid therapies.

All require specialised testing for diagnosis, and delays or missed diagnosis often leads to death, serious chronic illness or blindness, say the team of experts.

As a result the Journal decided to signal an end to the neglect by commissioning an authoritative series of articles, coving almost all aspects of fungal diseases, focusing on the global inequalities in treatment. It brought together experts from six continents.

Denning and Professor Juan Luis Rodriguez Tudela, also from the University of Manchester, and the Global Action Fund for Fungal Infections, have co-ordinated the eight paper series.

Denning said: "The massive advances in fungal disease and understanding over the last two decades should have resulted in much better outcomes -- but sadly not in many countries. The first anti-fungal medicines were introduced in 1959, but are still not available in 40 countries."

He added,"Diagnosis can be tricky and these diseases are missed a lot in people for a variety of reasons. Some of the long names of the diseases are hardwork, and in many parts of the world there is simply no treatment available."

"China is one of the countries waking up big time to the impact of fungal diseases. But we need to see a greater awareness of other parts of the world," Tudela added: "Improvements in patient outcomes require changes in all part of the health care 'ecosystem', notably clinical training, access to and resource for fungal diagnostics, access to affordable antifungal therapy. A major public health response is called for."

According to the researchers, there has been a complete absence of proposals or commentary on integration of fungal diseases into health care systems.

Experts want a 'combined health systems and public health approaches' citing examples of work in Mozambique, Kenya, India, and South Africa.

Denning added: "The evidence gathered in this article series shows not only the scale of the global problem but also that hundreds of thousands of deaths a year could be avoided. The expertise is available, now it just needs government and international action to make it a reality."