Climate change and health vulnerability and adaptation assessment
In 2013 the World Health Organization (WHO) published the report Protecting health from climate change:
vulnerability and adaptation assessment. The aim was to provide basic and flexible guidance on conducting national or subnati...onal assessments of current and future vulnerability (the susceptibility of a population or region to harm) to the health risks of climate change, and of policies and programmes that could increase resilience, taking into account the multiple determinants of climate-sensitive health outcomes.
That guidance has been a very useful tool, applied to more than 50 countries and settings, and has helped countries to prepare their health contributions to United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change national adaptation plans.
Since the launch of the guidance, WHO, technical partners such as Health Canada, and countries have learned much in terms of its applicability in different countries, at national and local levels.
At the same time, knowledge on climate change and health has increased.
WHO, the Pan American Health Organization and Health Canada have produced this updated version, which aims to better support countries in their assessments by proposing a simpler tool that incorporates all lessons learned.
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INTRODUCTION: The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted health systems around the world. The objectives of this study are to estimate the overall effect of the pandemic on essential health service use and outcomes in Mexico, describe observed and predicted trends in services over 24 months, and to estimat...e the number of visits lost through December 2020.
METHODS: We used health information system data for January 2019 to December 2020 from the Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS), which provides health services for more than half of Mexico's population-65 million people. Our analysis includes nine indicators of service use and three outcome indicators for reproductive, maternal and child health and non-communicable disease services. We used an interrupted time series design and linear generalised estimating equation models to estimate the change in service use and outcomes from April to December 2020. Estimates were expressed using average marginal effects on the risk ratio scale.
RESULTS: The study found that across nine health services, an estimated 8.74 million patient visits were lost in Mexico. This included a decline of over two thirds for breast and cervical cancer screenings (79% and 68%, respectively), over half for sick child visits and female contraceptive services, approximately one-third for childhood vaccinations, diabetes, hypertension and antenatal care consultations, and a decline of 10% for deliveries performed at IMSS. In terms of patient outcomes, the proportion of patients with diabetes and hypertension with controlled conditions declined by 22% and 17%, respectively. Caesarean section rate did not change.
CONCLUSION: Significant disruptions in health services show that the pandemic has strained the resilience of the Mexican health system and calls for urgent efforts to resume essential services and plan for catching up on missed preventive care even as the COVID-19 crisis continues in Mexico.
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Lancet Public health 2022 January 6, 2022 https://doi.org/10.1016/ S2468-2667(21)00249-8
Growth in the number of individuals living with dementia underscores the need for public health planning efforts and policy to address the needs of this group. Country-level estimates can be used to inform nati...onal planning efforts and decisions. Multifaceted approaches, including scaling up interventions to address modifiable risk factors and investing in research on biological mechanisms, will be key in addressing the expected increases in the number of individuals affected by dementia.
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History has shown that governments tend to deprioritize environmental commitments during times of financial and public crises as they work to mitigate immediate needs—and the age of COVID-19 has been no different. Even though human interaction with wildlife is believed to be the cause of the pande...mic, the focus on COVID’s fallout has deprioritized the importance of reversing the damage humans have done to the planet.
COVID has had a multifaceted and detrimental effect on environmental conservation. Not only has funding been diverted to deal with the pandemic, conservation-oriented organizations are operating with minimal staff or have closed entirely. People whose daily work it is to advance environmental science and protect the land and water have become ill or have been forced to stay home because of travel restrictions. Plastic use is at an all-time high.
The good news is that there is an unprecedented opportunity for philanthropy to recharge the effort to protect the planet. This Giving Smarter Guide examines the state of environmental philanthropy, and provides an overview of potential strategic starting points for philanthropy and impact capital to play a role in saving the planet. In addition to offering recommendations specific to the COVID-19 response, the Center for Strategic Philanthropy also asks the questions that philanthropists should consider at the start of their journey into the field of conservation philanthropy.
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Community pharmacists are the health professionals most accessible to the public and are a cornerstone of primary health care. The role of community pharmacists is expanding globally. This report provides an overview of existing components and provisions of the legal and regulatory framework for com...munity pharmacies and their activities in Europe. It presents the diverse approaches to community pharmacy licenses and to establishment of new pharmacies and their ownership. It also details the framework for community pharmacy operating requirements (including opening hours, workforce, premises and equipment, services provided and identification of a community pharmacy) and the types of activity undertaken. Provisions associated with possible alternative forms of dispensing medicines (over-the-counter medicines, prescription-only medicines, dispensing by medical doctors and online medicine sales) are also described
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The purpose of cancer screening tests is to detect pre-cancer or early-stage cancer in asymptomatic individuals so that timely diagnosis and early treatment can be offered, where this treatment can lead to better outcomes for some people.
The aim of a cancer screening programme is either to reduc...e mortality and morbidity in a population by early detection and early treatment of a cancer (for example, breast screening) or to reduce the incidence of a cancer by identifying and treating its precursors (such as cervical and colorectal screening).
This short guide is designed to be a quick reference that contains the important ideas about cancer screening. Readers should refer to other publications for comprehensive discussion and detailed guidance on cancer screening programmes.
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scientific brief, 2 March 2022
In this edition, the Antimicrobial Resistance chapter discusses the growing, dangerous trend of antimicrobial resistance and the potential catastrophic consequences on global health.
Chapter 1 of Frontier 2017: Emerging Issues of Environmental Concern
Il est prouvé que l’activité physique régulière aide à prévenir et à traiter les maladies non transmissibles (MNT), telles que les cardiopathies,
les accidents vasculaires cérébraux, le diabète, ainsi que les cancers du sein et du côlon. Elle aide également à prévenir l’hypertensi...on, la surcharge pondérale et l’obésité, et peut améliorer la santé mentale, la qualité de vie et le bien-être.
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In 2015, 5.9 million children under age five died (1). The major causes of child deaths globally are pneumonia, prematurity, intrapartum-related complications, neonatal sepsis, congenital anomalies, diarrhoea, injuries and malaria (2). Most of these diseases and conditions are at least partially cau...sed by the environment. It was estimated in 2012 that 26% of childhood deaths and 25% of the total disease burden in children under five could be prevented through the reduction of environmental risks such as air pollution, unsafe water, sanitation and inadequate hygiene or chemicals.
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En 2015, murieron 5,9 millones de niños menores de cinco años (1). Las principales causas de muerte en los niños a nivel mundial son la neumonía, la prematuridad, las complicaciones durante el parto, la sepsis neonatal, las anomalías congénitas, las enfermedades diarreicas, las lesiones ...y la malaria (2). La mayoría de estas enfermedades y condiciones son provocadas al menos en parte por el medio ambiente.
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En 2015, 5,9 millions d'enfants de moins de cinq ans sont décédés (1). Les principales causes de mortalité infantile dans le monde sont la pneumonie, la prématurité, les complications durant l'accouchement, la septicémie néonatale, les anomalies congénitales, la diarrhée, les tra...umatismes accidentels et le paludisme (2). La plupart de ces maladies et de ces problèmes sont, du moins en partie, causés par l'environnement. On a estimé en 2012 que 26 % des décès infantiles et 25 % de la charge totale de morbidité des enfants de moins de cinq ans pourraient être évités par la réduction des risques environnement aux tels que la pollution de l'air, l'insalubrité de l'eau, les mauvaises conditions d'hygiène et d'assainissement ou les produits chimiques.
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Current Environmental Health Reports volume 7, pages 363–370 (2020)
Climate change has direct impacts on human health, but those impacts vary widely by location. Local health impacts depend on a large number of factors including specific regional climate impacts, demographics and human vulnerabil...ities, and existing local adaptation capacity. There is a need to incorporate local data and concerns into climate adaptation plans and evaluate different approaches.
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Road safety is an issue that does not receive anywhere near the attention it deserves – and it really is one
of our great opportunities to save lives around the world
Extreme heat events (EHEs) are a leading cause of weather-related injury and death in the United States, and under a changing climate, these meteorological episodes are predicted to increase in both frequency and intensity. Prolonged heat exposure from EHEs places an increased strain on the heart an...d may lead to heat-related illness if the cardiovascular system fails to properly thermoregulate internal body temperature. Every individual is susceptible to heat-related illness, however, those with reduced cardiovascular function and pre-existing cardiovascular diseases are at a greater risk for morbidity and mortality during EHEs. This document gives an overview of our current understanding of heat exposure and its impact on cardiovascular health outcomes, an overview of the medications that may exacerbate heat-related cardiovascular illness, and asummary of the interaction between extreme heat and air pollutants, and their collective impact on cardiovascular health. Additionally, this document summarizes epidemiologic evidence and identifies gaps in the extant peer-reviewed literature on the effectiveness of strategies and interventions to protect against heat-related cardiovascular disease and death. This information is intended to aid health departments and other health professionals in understanding and responding to the impacts of heat exposure on cardiovascular health.
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Climate change has important implications for the health and futures of children and young people, yet they have little power to limit its harm, making them vulnerable to climate anxiety. This is the first large-scale investigation of climate anxiety in children and young people globally and its rel...ationship with perceived government response.
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Human use of land has been transforming Earth's ecology for millennia. From hunting and foraging to burning the land to farming to industrial agriculture, increasingly intensive human use of land has reshaped global patterns of biodiversity, ecosystems, landscapes, and climate. This review examines ...recent evidence from archaeology, paleoecology, environmental history, and model-based reconstructions that reveal a planet largely transformed by land use over more than 10,000 years. Although land use has always sustained human societies, its ecological consequences are diverse and sometimes opposing, both degrading and enriching soils, shrinking wild habitats and shaping novel ones, causing extinctions of some species while propagating and domesticating others, and both emitting and absorbing the greenhouse gases that cause global climate change. By transforming Earth's ecology, land use has literally paved the way for the Anthropocene.
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This report provides an overview of the main findings of the 2019–2020 harmonised AMR monitoring in the main food-producing animal populations monitored, in carcase/meat samples and in humans. Where available, monitoring data obtained from pigs, calves, broilers, laying hens and turkeys, as well a...s from carcase/meat samples and humans were combined and compared at the EU level, with particular emphasis on multidrug resistance, complete susceptibility and combined resistance patterns to critically important antimicrobials, as well as Salmonella and E. coli isolates possessing ESBL-/AmpC-/carbapenemase phenotypes.
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In 2013 the World Health Organization (WHO) published the report Protecting health from climate change:vulnerability and adaptation assessment. The aim was to provide basic and flexible guidance on conducting national or subnational assessments of current and future vulnerability (the susceptibilit...y of a population or region to harm) to the health risks of climate change, and of policies and programmes that could increase resilience, taking into account the multiple determinants of climate-sensitive health outcomes.
That guidance has been a very useful tool, applied to more than 50 countries and settings, and has helped countries to prepare their health contributions to United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change national adaptation plans.
Since the launch of the guidance, WHO, technical partners such as Health Canada, and countries have learned much in terms of its applicability in different countries, at national and local levels.
At the same time, knowledge on climate change and health has increased.
WHO, the Pan American Health Organization and Health Canada have produced this updated version, which aims to better support countries in their assessments by proposing a simpler tool that incorporates
all lessons learned.
more