Carter Centre commends UAE contributions to Guinea-worm eradication campaign

ABU DHABI, 30th June, 2016 (WAM) -- His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces, has gifted US$5 million to The Carter Centre for the eradication of Guinea-worm disease, Dracunculiasis.

For more than two decades, the UAE has been a major partner in the Guinea-worm eradication campaign, beginning with a financial commitment made by the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan in 1990. In 2012, President His Highness Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, renewed the UAE''s pledge to this public health cause by earmarking US$10 million to The Carter Centre, making the country not only one of the first champions of this effort, but also one of its most prominent donors. Current support includes a 2015 gift of US$5 million from His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces.

Dr. Maha Barakat, Director-General of the Health Authority Abu Dhabi, HAAD, and Saif Saeed Ghobash, Director-General of Abu Dhabi Tourism and Culture Authority, TCA, inaugurated a preview of the exhibition, "Countdown to Zero: Defeating Disease" at Yas Mall on Monday. Organised in partnership with The Carter Center in Atlanta, GA, in collaboration with the American Museum of Natural History in New York, the exhibition highlights global efforts to eradicate and eliminate human disease, including Guinea-worm, which could soon become the second human disease ever to be eradicated, after smallpox. The preview exhibition will run at Yas Mall until 10th July, and the full exhibition will open in the UAE later this year.

The Carter Centre, in partnership with various entities and stakeholders, has led global efforts to eradicate Guinea-worm disease since 1986. The Carter Centre is a non-profit organisation founded in 1982 by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter and his wife Rosalynn, and works to advance human rights and alleviate human suffering.

Former President Carter recently acknowledged this support by giving Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan the second of fifty limited-edition prints of his painting, White Dove. The gift will be showcased to the public at the full exhibition, which will be held later in the year.

"For more than two decades, the United Arab Emirates has been an instrumental partner in the Carter Centre''s global effort to eradicate Guinea-worm disease, an ancient affliction. The Centre is pleased to further collaborate with the UAE to bring the exhibition Countdown to Zero to the Emirates and explore the challenges and successes of disease elimination in the modern, interconnected world," said Ambassador (retired) Mary Ann Peters, Carter Centre CEO.

Carter Centre Trustee, Douglas Nelson, represented the Carter Centre during the opening of the preview exhibition in Yas Mall. Mr. Nelson currently serves as the Chairman of the Centre for Disease Control Foundation, and is the retired President and CEO of the Annie E. Casey Foundation, one of the largest philanthropic organisations in the United States.

Guinea-worm is a parasite that enters the human body in contaminated drinking water. While there is no cure or vaccine for Guinea-worm disease, it can be eradicated through community health education, and low-tech interventions, such as filtering all drinking water via cloth water filters. The Carter Centre-led Guinea-worm eradication campaign has driven the global incidence of Guinea-worm disease down to only 22 cases reported in 4 endemic countries in 2015, a reduction of more than 99.99 percent since 1986. To date, 198 countries have been certified as free of Guinea-worm disease by the World Health Organisation, the only agency that can officially certify the eradication of a disease.