Make your MOVE

Doctors MOVE to fight against pneumonia

By: Bettina

 

Did you know that pneumonia has become the top killer of Filipino children today?

There are 36 children who die because of pneumonia every day, or almost 13,500 Filipino children dying every year.

“People don’t think that pneumonia is a major threat anymore,” says Dr. Lulu Bravo, executive director of the National Institutes of Health. And if this was not true, then there wouldn’t be this much number of children affected by this ‘old’ disease up until now. Not because it’s already curable and preventable, it’s already good enough to ignore.

Together with hundreds of pediatricians from all over the country, Bravo dances with her fellow doctors to raise pneumonia awareness. Steering away from the usual schemes like holding seminars or distributing flyers, these dancing doctors took a different step towards reaching out.

Doctors warm up for the dance routine

“We wanted to do something different… we want to be able to move people,” Bravo shares, emphasizing on what the name of the event signifies. According to Bravo, she is hopeful that showcasing a dance spectacle would be more engaging for other people “to stand up, take notice and most especially move against pneumonia.”

Moving against pneumonia
“Pneumonia is the #1 vaccine-preventable cause of death not only in the Philippines but in the whole world,” says Bravo. Through the MOVE! event, every dancing doctor who participated will be able to protect a child from this disease. Each doctor will receive one pneumococcal disease vaccine given in their behalf to the National Institutes of Health, all from GlaxoSmithKline. This vaccine will be given to children from the poorest of the poor who cannot afford to get the vaccine, and who just can’t afford to get sick.

Pinoy Big Brother Housemate and the events’ dancing coach Mickey Perz also joined the event. “I’m really committed to this thrust of preventing this killer disease; and dancing is one of the main contributions that I can do.” He led the doctors in dancing as he taught them his “fight against pneumonia” dance steps.

Mickey Perz joins the advocacy

Moving for better health care
GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), in coordination with the National Institutes of Health, organized this event as one of their initiatives. In line with their commitment to improving the quality of life by enabling people to do more, feel better and live longer, MOVE! has become a venue to do just that.

But other than providing the vaccines for MOVE!, GSK is taking a step further in their efforts to fight against pneumonia as they offer their pneumococcal vaccine 40 percentlower than its usual price. This idea stemmed out from GSK’s ValueHealth Philosophy, putting prime importance in offering significant price reductions from GSK’s original branded medicines as a response to the Filipinos’ need for improved access to high quality and affordable vaccines and medicines.

With the help of all these doctors, fight against pneumonia now while you still can. As Mickey Perz said, “With no lung problems, everyone’s happy!”

For more information about pneumonia and pneumococcal disease vaccination, please visit your physician.

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