The DHS report itself explains the purpose was, “to obtain and provide information on basic indicators of social progress including fertility, childhood mortality, reproductive
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and child health, nutritional status of children, and awareness of HIV/AIDS and other health-related issues” in PNG. This is important because a DHS then provides the evidence base for PNG officials themselves to track progress in PNG over time, compare trends with other comparable countries, and then allocate financial and human resources to where they are needed most.
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COVID-19 disproportionately affects the poor and vulnerable. Community health workers are poised to play a pivotal role in fighting the pandemic, especially in countries with less resilient
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health systems. Drawing from practitioner expertise across four WHO regions, this article outlines the targeted actions needed at different stages of the pandemic to achieve the following goals: (1) PROTECT healthcare workers, (2) INTERRUPT the virus, (3) MAINTAIN existing healthcare services while surging their capacity, and (4) SHIELD the most vulnerable from socioeconomic shocks. While decisive action must be taken now to blunt the impact of the pandemic in countries likely to be hit the hardest, many of the investments in the supply chain, compensation, dedicated supervision, continuous training and performance management necessary for rapid community response in a pandemic are the same as those required to achieve universal healthcare and prevent the next epidemic.
BMJ Global Health2020;5:e002550. doi:10.1136/bmjgh-2020-002550
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The chapter Closing the Gap: The Health Disparities of Older LGBTI People in the Americas, is part of the publication series titled ‘Decade
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of Healthy Aging: situation and challenges’. In order to outline the current knowledge available on the situation of health and well-being of older persons in the Americas at the beginning of the United Nations Decade of Healthy Aging (2021-2030), this document presents data and existing evidence different forms of discrimination and mistreatment older people face due to their sexual orientation and gender identities that ultimately increase health disparities. Previous studies on LGBTI older people offer valuable information on the lived experiences of these communities and demonstrate that they face unique challenges with aging, emphasizing the difficulties related to access to care. Very few studies on older people and aging include a focus on sexual orientation or gender identity; however, it is possible to point out that HIV/AIDS is one of the most significant health disparities confronting LGBTI older persons, followed by physical and mental health problems, substance use, social isolation, poverty, and the lack of access to quality healthcare, including long-term care facilities or other institutions. Closing the gap in access and quality of health and care services is an imperative to increase longevity, health status and quality of life of LGBTI older people.
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This document describes the key areas that national governments should consider for the introduction and scale-up of point-of-care (POC) diagnostic
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s within national programmes, as new innovative POC technologies are being introduced into the market. The next steps taken to include these new innovations within the broader context of national diagnostic networks of conventional laboratories could influence the achievement of the 2030 Fast Track targets for ending the AIDS epidemic.
POC diagnostics, when strategically introduced and integrated into national diagnostic networks, may help catalyse changes that improve the way diagnostics and clinical services are delivered. This document distils this understanding based on programmatic and market experiences of introducing POC diagnostics through catalytic investments in POC HIV technologies across numerous countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
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The primary audience for the guideline is policy makers and health programme managers of MNCH and
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immunization programmes in ministries of health where decisions are made and policies created on the use and implementation of homebased records.
The guideline is also aimed at health providers who use home-based records as a tool for recording information and providing health education or communicating key information. Development and international agencies and non-governmental organizations that support the implementation of home-based records will also find this guideline of use.
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This document has been developed to support countries to develop and strengthen peer support groups in mental health and related areas. It addresse
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s the provision of peer support groups in the context of health services and the wider community.
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Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2018, 15(12), 2626; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15122626
Climate change is increasing risks to human health
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and to the health systems that seek to protect the safety and well-being of populations. Health authorities require information about current associations between health outcomes and weather or climate, vulnerable populations, projections of future risks and adaptation opportunities in order to reduce exposures, empower individuals to take needed protective actions and build climate-resilient health systems. An increasing number of health authorities from local to national levels seek this information by conducting climate change and health vulnerability and adaptation assessments. While assessments can provide valuable information to plan for climate change impacts, the results of many studies are not helping to build the global evidence-base of knowledge in this area. They are also often not integrated into adaptation decision making, sometimes because the health sector is not involved in climate change policy making processes at the national level. Significant barriers related to data accessibility, a limited number of climate and health models, uncertainty in climate projections, and a lack of funding and expertise, particularly in developing countries, challenge health authority efforts to conduct rigorous assessments and apply the findings. This paper examines the evolution of climate change and health vulnerability and adaptation assessments, including guidance developed for such projects, the number of assessments that have been conducted globally and implementation of the findings to support health adaptation action. Greater capacity building that facilitates assessments from local to national scales will support collaborative efforts to protect health from current climate hazards and future climate change. Health sector officials will benefit from additional resources and partnership opportunities to ensure that evidence about climate change impacts on health is effectively translated into needed actions to build health resilience.
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The purpose of this guidance is to assist WHO Member States, and other stakeholders, in the establishment and
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development of programmes of integrated surveillance of antimicrobial resistance in foodborne bacteria (i.e., bacteria commonly transmitted by food). In this guidance, “integrated surveillance of antimicrobial resistance in foodborne bacteria” is defined as the collection, validation, analyses and reporting of relevant microbiological and epidemiological data on antimicrobial resistance in foodborne bacteria from humans, animals, and food, and on relevant antimicrobial use in humans and animals. Integrated surveillance of antimicrobial resistance in foodborne bacteria therefore includes data from relevant food chain sectors (animals, food and humans) and includes data on both antimicrobial resistance and antimicrobial use. Integrated surveillance of antimicrobial resistance for foodborne bacteria expands on traditional public health surveillance to include multiple elements of the food chain, and to include antimicrobial use data, to better understand the sources of infection and transmission routes.
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Shortages of healthcare workers is detrimental to the health of communities, especially children. This paper describes the process
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of capacity building Community Health Volunteers (CHVs) to deliver integrated preventive and curative package of care of services to manage common childhood illness in hard-to-reach communities in Bondo Subcounty, Kenya
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The threat climate change poses to health, equity, and development has been rigorously documented. However, in an era marked by economic crisis, re
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gional conflicts, natural disasters and growing disparities between rich and poor, the joint global actions required to address climate change have been vigorously debated – and critical decisions postponed.
This document, part of WHO’s Health in the Green Economy series, describes how many climate change measures can be “win-wins” for people and the planet.
These policies yield large, immediate public health benefits while reducing the upward trajectory of greenhouse gas emissions. Many of these policies can improve the health and equity of people in poor countries and assist developing countries in adapting to climate change that is already occurring, as evidenced by more extreme storms, flooding, drought and heatwaves.
WHO’s Department of Public Health and Environment launched the Health in the Green Economy initiative in 2010 to review potential health and equity “co-benefits” of proposed climate change measures – as well as relevant risks.
This review examines mitigation strategies discussed in the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change which constitutes the most broad-based global review of mitigation options by scientific experts.
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Helping Adolescents Thrive (HAT) is a joint WHO-UNICEF initiative to strengthen programming and policy responses for adolescents, to promote positive mental health, prevent mental
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health conditions,
and prevent self-harm and other risk behaviours. The vision of HAT is a world in which all adolescents, their caregivers, civil society and communities unite with governments to protect and promote adolescent mental health. This means taking action routinely to implement and monitor evidence-informed and human rights-based strategies for improving mental health, and to prevent and reduce mental health and substance use conditions in adolescents in order to improve lifelong well-being
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The report depicts the reality of forced displacement as a developing world crisis with implications for sustainable growth: 95 percent of the displaced live in developing countries
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and over half are in displacement for more than four years. To help the displaced, the report suggests ways to rebuild their lives with dignity through development support, focusing on their vulnerabilities such as loss of assets and lack of legal rights and opportunities. It also examines how to help host communities that need to manage the sudden arrival of large numbers of displaced people, under pressure to expand services, create jobs and address long-standing development issues.
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This report presents, for the first time, a global assessment of the extent to which health care facilities provide essential water, sanitation and
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hygiene (WASH) services. Drawing on data from 54 low- and middle-income countries, the report concludes that 38% lack access to even rudimentary levels of water, 19% lack sanitation and 35% do not have water and soap for handwashing. When a higher level of service is factored in, the situation deteriorates significantly. A number of areas require urgent action and WHO will work with UNICEF, Governments and other partners to develop a global plan to address the most pressing needs and ensure that all health care facilities have WASH services.
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The purpose of the situation assessment was to execute a situation analysis for Autism and Neurodevelopment Disorder (NDD) in Bangladesh. The situation assessment covers the following areas: a revie
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w of the scale and prevalence of NDD with trends of the disorder in the recent past in Bangladesh (see page 17); estimation of likely disease burden in the near future (see page 27); assessment of the social response to NDD in Bangladesh (see page 67); overview of the support and services required by persons with NDD (see page 79); an inventory of service providers working with NDD in Bangladesh (see page 85); an assessment of the adequacy of the existing services and support available for addressing NDD in country (see page 97); an overview of the role and preparedness of MOHFW and other stakeholders in addressing NDD in Bangladesh (see page 108); recommendations for monitoring, supervision and reporting mechanisms for NDD services at the national level (see page 167); and recommended key activities that should be undertaken by the Health and other relevant ministries in the short and medium term (see page 167).
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The Guidelines on promotive and preventive mental health interventions for adolescents - Helping Adolescents thrive (HAT), provide evidence-informed recommendations on psychosocial interventions to
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promote mental health, prevent mental disorders, and reduce self-harm and other risk behaviours among adolescents.
The HAT Guidelines aims to inform policy development, service planning and the strengthening of health and education systems, and facilitate mainstreaming of adolescent mental health promotion and prevention strategies across sectors and delivery platforms.
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This handbook follows a comprehensive approach to health system strengthening at borders in order to support IHR national focal points and other national agencies in developing
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and implementing evidence-based action plans for IHR capacity development at ground crossings. The approach includes the movement of travellers and baggage, cargo, containers, conveyances, goods and postal parcels across ground crossings, as well as the interaction with adjacent border communities. Other factors can be considered, if needed, throughout the risk assessment.
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In In recent years, China has increased its international engagement in health. Nonetheless, the lack
of data on contributions has limited efforts to examine contributions from China. Existing esti
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mates that track
development assistance for health (DAH) from China have relied primarily on one dataset. Furthermore, little is known
about the disbursing agencies especially the multilaterals through which contributions are disbursed and how these
are changing across time. In this study, we generated estimates of DAH from China from 2007 through 2017 and
disaggregated those estimates by disbursing agency and health focus area.
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Climate change (CC) impacts on health outcomes, both direct and indirect, are sufficient to jeopardize achieving the World Bank Group’s visions and
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agendas in poverty reduction, population resilience, and health, nutrition and population (HNP). In the last 5 years, the number of voices calling for stronger international action on climate change and health has increased, as have the scale and depth of activities. But current global efforts in climate and health are inadequately integrated. As a result, actions to address climate change, including World Bank Group (WBG) investment and lending, are missing opportunities to simultaneously promote better health outcomes and more resilient populations and health sectors. Accordingly, with the financial support of the Nordic Development Fund (NDF), the World Bank Group set out to develop an approach and a 4-year action plan, outlined in this paper, to integrate health-related climate considerations into selected WBG sector plans and investments.
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This policy brief has been developed in response to the contemporary challenge of antibiotic resistance (ABR). ABR poses a formidable threat to global health
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and sustainable development. It is now increasingly recognized that the systematic neglect of cultural factors is one of the biggest obstacles to achieving better health outcomes and better standards of living worldwide. Using a cultural contexts of health approach, the policy brief explores the centrality of culture to the challenge of ABR. The brief examines how the prescription and use of antibacterial medicines, the transmission of resistance, and the regulation and funding of research are influenced by cultural, social and commercial, as well as biological and technological factors. The brief moves beyond the ready equation of culture with individual behaviours and demonstrates how culture serve as an enabler of health and provide new possibilities for change.
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BackgroundClimate change is one of the great challenges of our time. The consequences of climate change on exposed biological subjects, as well as
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on vulnerable societies, are a concern for the entire scientific community. Rising temperatures, heat waves, floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, droughts, fires, loss of forest, and glaciers, along with disappearance of rivers and desertification, can directly and indirectly cause human pathologies that are physical and mental.
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