The new five-year agenda of WHO in Africa, The Africa Health Transformation Programme, 2015–20...20: a vision for universal health coverage, is the strategic framework that will guide WHO’s contribution to the emerging sustainable development platform in Africa. It articulates a vision for health and development that aims to address the unacceptable inequalities and inequities that have kept our region lagging far behind others in terms of health indices and enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of life.
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A review of current literature and up date data from the field, April 2015.
This report has been published in part in J Hosp Inf. 2015;90:1-9.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=ebola+nosocomial+shears
Africa is off track to reach the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030 and lags behind in building resilient health systems
and health security, a...gainst a backdrop of limited resources. The world envisaged a significant role for governments
in funding the Sustainable Development Agenda, but inadequate funding for health in African countries is
persistent, despite additional continental commitments to address the problem. When commitments to global health
targets and available fiscal space do not align, innovation is warranted.
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Children with disabilities in South Africa: The hidden reality is part of a multiple-country study conducted by ACPF. The study seeks to analyse ho...w cultural, social, physical and other societal barriers prevent children with disabilities from enjoying their constitutional rights to equality, freedom and human dignity. It also seeks to establish opportunities and practices that could be used to address these barriers to enhance disabled children’s participation in society.
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This report, examining the mood of a country that holds the top spot in the Fragile States Index, is based on field research conducted in South Sudan in April and May 2014.
This document presents a consolidated summary of urgent activities
required to advance preparedness, as elaborated in each country's
national plan, with a particular focus on Priority 1 countries. It
presents the estimated requirements, needs, an...d gaps for each of the
Priority 1 countries and a summary for Priority 2 countries, as
aligned for the period of July to December 2019.
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WHO South-East Asia Journal of Public Health, April 2017, 6(1) 8 pp. 211 kB
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is one of the most complex and long-standing humanitarian crises in ...medbox">Africa. By the end of 2020, some 940,421 Congolese refugees and asylum seekers were hosted across the African continent. Ongoing conflicts in eastern DRC, as well as intercommunal violence, continue to cause forced displacement within the DRC and into neighbouring countries, along with tragic loss of human life and destruction of communities.
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To guide One Health capacity building efforts in the Republic of Guinea in the wake of the 2014...2016 Ebola virus disease (EVD) outbreak, we sought to identify and assess the existing systems and structures for zoonotic disease detection and control. We partnered with the government ministries responsible for human, animal, and environmental health to identify a list of zoonotic diseases – rabies, anthrax, brucellosis, viral hemorrhagic fevers, trypanosomiasis and highly pathogenic avian influenza – as the country's top priorities. We used each priority disease as a case study to identify existing processes for prevention, surveillance, diagnosis, laboratory confirmation, reporting and response across the three ministries. Results were used to produce disease-specific systems “maps” emphasizing linkages across the systems, as well as opportunities for improvement. We identified brucellosis as a particularly neglected condition. Past efforts to build avian influenza capabilities, which had degraded substantially in less than a decade, highlighted the challenge of sustainability. We observed a keen interest across sectors to reinvigorate national rabies control, and given the regional and global support for One Health approaches to rabies elimination, rabies could serve as an ideal disease to test incipient One Health coordination mechanisms and procedures. Overall, we identified five major categories of gaps and challenges: (1) Coordination; (2) Training; (3) Infrastructure; (4) Public Awareness; and (5) Research. We developed and prioritized recommendations to address the gaps, estimated the level of resource investment needed, and estimated a timeline for implementation. These prioritized recommendations can be used by the Government of Guinea to plan strategically for future One Health efforts, ideally under the auspices of the national One Health Platform. This work demonstrates an effective methodology for mapping systems and structures for zoonotic diseases, and the benefit of conducting a baseline review of systemic capabilities prior to embarking on capacity building efforts.
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An international field study by African and German theologicans and health workers.
This report makes the case for a major new initiative—to rapidly recruit, train and deploy 2 million community health workers in Africa. Drawing on a vast body ...medbox">of evidence and substantial regional experience, the report shows how community health workers save lives and improve quality of life and how investments in community health workers effectively harness the demographic dividend, reduce gender inequality and accelerate economic growth and development. Indeed, the benefits of community health workers stretch from one end of the Agenda for Sustainable Development to the other.
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On 14 August 2024, the Director-General of the World Health Organization determined that the upsurge of mpox in a growing number ...bute-to-highlight medbox">of countries in Africa constitutes a new public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC) under the International Health Regulations (IHR) (2005)
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It is too early to know the full impact of COVID-19 on Africa. To date the experience has been varied. There are causes for concern, but also reasons for hope. Early estimates were pessimistic regar...ding the pandemic’s impact on the continent. But the relatively low numbers of COVID-19 cases reported thus far have raised hopes that African countries may be spared the worst of the pandemic. While the virus is present in all African countries, most countries have recorded fewer than 1,000 cases. The African Union acted swiftly, endorsing a joint continental strategy in February, and complementing efforts by Member States and Regional Economic Communities by providing a public health platform.
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Access to safe blood and blood products is recognized as one of the key requirements for delivery of modern health care in the journey towards ...n class="attribute-to-highlight medbox">health for all. The foundation of safe and sustainable blood supplies depends on the collection of blood from voluntary non-remunerated and low-risk donors. Data from the WHO Global Database for Blood Safety (GDBS) brings out several inadequacies related to the supply and safety of blood and blood products. These inadequacies include a number of variations in safe blood practices across the world, including the quantity of blood donated (voluntary and replacement types), quality and adequate testing of the donated blood (immunohaematology [IH] and transfusion-transmitted infections [TTIs]), rational use of blood and blood components such as appropriate patient blood management protocols. These variations are very high in countries of the South-East Asian Region and most of them are either low- or middle-income countries (LMICs).
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It is widely understood that the food insecurity crisis in the Sahel and the Horn of Africa is one of the world’s fastest growing and most neglec...ted crises. It lacks sufficient global focus, resources and urgency. As in so many crises, women and girls are disproportionately affected and shoulder the consequences of protracted neglect, with unconscionable impacts on their safety, life chances and agency.
Gaining a holistic view of the gendered drivers, risks and impacts of food insecurity in the Sahel and the Horn of Africa is difficult. This is due to a lack of data and prioritization, and the large geographical and socioeconomic terrain covered by both regions. However, what we do know about this crisis is more than enough to urgently address the needs of women and girls.
An OCHA discussion paper on this topic (which will be published imminently, and from which this policy brief is drawn) found that there is:
A strong risk of profound regression in gender equality gains made to date in the countries of concern, including on education, sexual and reproductive health, and the economic independence of women and girls (with knock-on effects on broader humanitarian and development outcomes).
An increasing challenge to reverse what must be recognized as a protracted and growing gender-based violence (GBV) emergency in the Sahel and the Horn of Africa.
The food insecurity crisis in the Sahel and the Horn of Africa is protracted, multidimensional and highly gendered, with spiralling impacts on gender equality and food security outcomes. It is driven by interwoven and overlapping factors, including climate change, political instability, conflict, socioeconomic conditions, migration and displacement and, more recently, COVID-19 and the war in Ukraine. Interlinked with these factors are gendered structural drivers of food insecurity, including deeply entrenched gender inequalities and harmful social norms. Gendered risks and impacts of food insecurity include alarming limitations on access to education, sexual and reproductive health rights, women’s agency and participation, and dramatic increases in different existing forms of GBV and the emergence of new ones. Recognition of such gendered dimensions of food insecurity and of the need for a multisectoral approach in the response is key to addressing the crisis, along-side sustained commitment and adequate allocation of resources. This policy brief draws out key findings from the OCHA discussion paper on this topic, which includes a desk review of studies, assessments and reports, and interviews with local women’s organizations on the front lines of the food insecurity crisis in communities across both regions.
Below are the most pressing gendered drivers, risks and impacts of food insecurity (not in order of priority), as well as key gaps in the current humanitarian response to food insecurity, and recommendations to take forward.
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PLoS Med 16(3): e1002768. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1002768
Home delivery and late and infrequent attendance at antenatal care (ANC) are responsible for substantial avoidable maternal and pediatric morbidity and mortality in sub-Saharan Afric...a. This cluster-randomized trial aimed to determine the impact of a community health worker (CHW) intervention on the proportion of women who visit ANC fewer than 4 times during their pregnancy and deliver at home.
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Cervical cancer continues to be a significant public health problem and a major cause of premature mortality among women, disproportionately affecting the socioeconomically disadvantaged population ...in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). In the absence of implementing the known evidence-based, cost-effective interventions, the number of deaths per year is projected to reach approximately 416 000 globally in 2035. It was estimated in 2020 that 32% of incident cervical cancer cases and 34% of cervical cancer deaths in the world occurred in the 11 Member States of the WHO South-East Asia (SEA) Region. In 2020, 190 874 new cases and 116 015 deaths were estimated due to cervical cancer, which is the third commonest cancer in the Region
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Executive summary On 27th and 28th April 2021, the division of Disease Control and Prevention in collaboration with Public Health England, organized a virtual consultative meeting as part ...s="attribute-to-highlight medbox">of the consultations with Member States and partners for the development of the Africa CDC five years strategic plan for the prevention and control of Non-communicable Diseases … Report: Expert and stakeholder virtual consultation meeting to develop the Africa CDC Non-Communicable Diseases and Mental Health Strategy
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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) diagnostics 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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This report from Human Rights Watch found that South Africa has failed to guarantee the right to education for many of the country’s children and... young adults due to widespread discrimination against children with disabilities in enrollment decisions. Human Rights Watch research in five out of South Africa’s nine provinces showed that children with disabilities face discriminatory physical and attitudinal barriers, often beginning early in children’s lives when government officials classify them according to their disabilities. Human Rights Watch August 2015
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