Communicating NCDs: Why it matters

MANILA, Philippines — As non-communicable diseases remain a top health concern in the world, a World Health Organization (WHO) official said that being able to communicate the risks of these diseases can drive the formation of better policies and improve health literacy to prevent them.

“You as journalists have huge influence on people’s health literacy, on the motivations on the kind of changes that we need,” said Olivia Lawe-Davies in a media workshop held in Cubao, Quezon City on Wednesday.

“Well-researched articles, based on strong evidence and recommendations and that includes powerful human stories are ways that can guide policymakers to enact constitutions and laws that we need to change these environments and people’s behaviors in their daily lives,” Lawe-Davies added.

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Further, Lawe-Davies also said that several principles are important in making sure that NCDs and their risks are properly communicated by journalists.

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“These six principles are all important, and interrelated. You can’t be reliable and trusted if we can’t be accessible. You can’t be actionable if you can’t be timely. You can’t be understandable if you’re not relevant… We have to make sure that we fulfill these principles in the work that we do,” she added.

READ: WHO: Premature death risk due to NCDs in PH among highest in region

She also mentioned that the World Health Organization (WHO) has an important role to play in working with journalists to “catalyze those changes.”

“We need to make sure that we’re helping you as WHO by giving you the latest information, evidence, recommendations so you can help tell those stories and reach your audience,” she noted.

The workshop conducted by Probe Media Foundation, supported by the World Health Organization (WHO) Western Pacific Regional Office, brought journalists from the Philippines, Malaysia, Mongolia, China, Papua New Guinea, and Lao People’s Democratic Republic.

Moreover, journalists shared their point of views of NCDs from their home countries where it was noted that NCDs continue to be a health concern in the Western Pacific.

A data by the WHO showed that 12 million people in the region died from NCDs in 2019.

Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) such as cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, cancer, and chronic respiratory diseases may not be infectious to others but it continues to account for most causes of deaths around the world, according to the WHO.

Data shown by Xi Yin, Coordinator of the NCD Prevention and Health Promotion of the WHO Western Pacific Regional Office, in the same media workshop, said that ¾ of all deaths in the world are from NCD.

Yin also said that the driving factors of NCDs are the following: modifiable behavioral risk factors, biological factors, social determinants, environmental and structural drivers, climate change, commercial drivers, population ageing.