Margaret Chan Quotes

I am not saying do not give people equal health services but do not pretend that giving more money for diabetes or chronic diseases means you are going to deal with the origins of health inequalities.

Let's make health care a meritocracy. Access to the best care goes to people who did what they could to avoid becoming ill.

In Illinois, community, migrant, homeless and public housing health centers operate 268 primary care sites and serve close to 1 million patients every year.

The United States has the best sick care system in the world, however, the health care system remains fragmented and limited, particularly for African Americans who carry a disproportionate burden of disease, hunger, homelessness, and poverty.

In the same vein as these events, National Minority Health Month also serves as a reminder of how much work needs to be done to eliminate health and healthcare inequities.

Universal coverage, not medical technology, is the foundation of any caring health care system.

I want us to be judged by the impact we have on the health of the people of Africa and the health of women. Improvements in the health of the people of Africa and the health of women are key indicators of the performance of WHO. This is a health organization for the whole world... But we must focus our attention on the people in greatest need.

For just a few dollars a dose, vaccines save lives and help reduce poverty. Unlike medical treatment, they provide a lifetime of protection from deadly and debilitating disease. They are safe and effective. They cut healthcare and treatment costs, reduce the number of hospital visits, and ensure healthier children, families and communities.

Especially some of the poorest in our society need to have the greatest support because health inequalities are too wide.

I can attest to the very real potential for unnecessary pain, suffering, and death when the work of public-health officials is curtailed.

90 percent of children with leukemia can be cured, but 90 percent of the children with that disease in the world’s 25 poorest countries die from it.

Disease does not recognize congressional districts or party affiliation.

The world is rich enought today that the idea of millions of children dying of disease is unacceptable. We have the resouurces and know how to prevent this.

In terms of medicine, I've generally been pretty interested in public health issues as they relate to sub-Saharan Africa on a broad scale - HIV/AIDS, malaria etc.

Low socioeconomic status carries with it an enormously increased risk of a broad range of diseases, and this gradient cannot be fully explained by factors such as health-care access.

Excellence in health means devoting your life to ending poverty.

New vaccines are being developed all the time, which could save many more lives and dramatically improve people's health. And this goes beyond the traditional burden of childhood infectious diseases.

How do you deliver the best possible and affordable health care to maximize health?

Community health centers do a great deal with limited resources. They provide critical medical care services to many who would otherwise have no other place to go or would end up in an emergency room.

That the AIDS pandemic is threatening sustainable development in Africa only reinforces the reality that health is at the center of sustainable development.

If you look upon chronic diseases as an epidemic, and you see that the chronically ill are the poor, then you see that this issue of the uninsured is not really a moral but a financial obligation to change health care.

It is clear that the pharmaceutical industry is not, by any stretch of the imagination, doing enough to ensure that the poor have access to adequate medical care.

Science is beginning to catch up with global health problems.

That's the thing. in medicine, you're used to saying there's a problem within the person, and saying there's a problem within the culture, that's not a medical answer. Medicine has to look in one direction, so there's only one type of answer that they can find.

Perfect health, like perfect beauty, is a rare thing; and so, it seems, is perfect disease.