![\"scrubbing](\"http:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/624\/media\/images\/82555000\/jpg\/_82555186_scrubbing_up_before_surgery-spl.jpg\")
They say a third of all deaths in 2010 (16.9 million) were from conditions which were treatable with surgery.<\/p>\n
That was more than the number of deaths from HIV\/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria combined.<\/p>\n
The authors suggest the cost to the global economy of doing nothing will be more than $12 trillion between now and 2030.<\/p>\n
They are calling for a $420bn global investment.<\/p>\n
These are enormous figures and – as is nearly always the case – the greatest need is in the poorest countries.<\/p>\n Source: The Lancet study<\/p>\n A key challenge is training enough surgeons, anaesthetists and obstetricians.<\/p>\n In higher income countries such as the UK, there are around 35 surgical specialists per 100,000 people, whereas in Bangladesh there are 1.7 per 100,000 population.<\/p>\n Lead author John Meara Kletjian, professor in global surgery at Harvard Medical School, said: “Although the scale-up costs are large, the costs of inaction are higher, and will accumulate progressively with delay.”<\/p>\n “There is a pervasive misconception that the costs of providing safe and accessible surgery put it beyond the reach of any but the richest countries,” he added.<\/p>\n Experts in the field say surgery is a basic and crucial health need that has been largely ignored by the global health community, with tragic consequences.<\/p>\n “The agenda has been so much focused on individual diseases and, because surgical care is spread across so many diseases, it’s been missed off,” said Andy Leather said.<\/p>\n “There’s a myth there isn’t a burden of surgical disease, that it’s too costly and it’s just for the urban elite.”<\/p>\n ‘People have given up’<\/p>\n London-based consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist, Shane Duffy, has recently returned from a surgical training camp in central Uganda.<\/p>\n There he has been teaching local doctors how to carry out very specialised ‘fistula repair surgery’.<\/p>\n This is for women who have had obstructed labours.<\/p>\n Most sufferers lose their babies during child birth and are left with a damaged bladder, or bowels, which can leave them incontinent and rejected by their families.<\/p>\n “Unfortunately a lot of people have given up on the hospitals because they can’t find surgeons there,” said Dr Duffy.<\/p>\n “People are living in the community with debilitating conditions and they just can’t find the skilled people to help them.”<\/p>\n Source: The Lancet\/BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Two-thirds of the world’s population have no access to safe and affordable surgery, according to a new study in The Lancet – more than double the number in previous estimates. It means millions of people are dying from treatable conditions such as appendicitis and obstructed labour. Most live in low and middle-income countries. The study […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":111803,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[15,38],"yoast_head":"\n![\"line\"](\"http:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/624\/media\/images\/82554000\/jpg\/_82554371_line976.jpg\")
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