![]() ![]() The Aga Khan Health Services (AKHS), the Aga Khan University (AKU) and the Aga Khan Foundation (AKF) engaged with Ministries of Health to develop country- as well as area-specific COVID-19 preparedness plans. We began by tracking the pandemic in early 2020. How has AKDN responded during the pandemic? Can you speak about the Global Task Force and your role? In the work of AKHS, and as part of the COVID-19 response, we have increased our health promotion and disease prevention activities to address risk factors for NCDs, as well as augmented our efforts to diagnose and treat disease early. In fact, at the World Health Organization (WHO), Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO Director-General, has said that “the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the full danger of noncommunicable diseases – and signalled the urgent need for stronger public health policies and investment to prevent them”. Nearly three-quarters of all deaths around the world are caused by NCDs, so the urgency of the problem was only further highlighted by COVID-19. The majority of those who have died from COVID-19 had an underlying NCD, such as obesity, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, chronic lung disease or cancer. In fact, underlying conditions brought on by NCDs have led to a rise in the death toll from COVID-19. Because COVID-19 is an infectious disease, people often think that our focus on non-communicable diseases (NCDs) has become less intense.
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