Connecting global priorities: biodiversity and human health: a state of knowledge review
South Africa has a long history of community health workers (CHWs). It has been a journey that has required balancing constrained resources and competing priorities. CHWs form ...-to-highlight medbox">a bridge between communities and healthcare service provision within health facilities and act as the cornerstone of South Africa’s Ward-Based Primary Healthcare Outreach Teams. This study aimed to document the CHW policy implementation landscape across six provinces in South Africa and explore the reasons for local adaptation of CHW models and to identify potential barriers and facilitators to implementation of the revised framework to help guide and inform future planning.
more
New displacements by conflict and disasters in 2020
Mortality statistics are fundamental to public health decision making. Mortality varies by time and location, and its measurement is affected by well known biases that have been exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper aims to estimate excess mortality from ...the COVID-19 pandemic in 191 countries and territories, and 252 subnational units for selected countries, from Jan 1, 2020, to Dec 31, 2021.
The Lancet. 10 March 2022. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(21)02796-3.
more
Brucellosis is widespread in both humans and livestock in many developing countries. The authors have performed a series of epidemiological studies on brucellosis in agro-pastoral areas in Tanzania since 2015, with the aim of the disease control. Pr...eviously, the potential of a community-based brucellosis control initiative, which mainly consisted of the sale of cattle with experience of abortion and vaccinating calves, was assessed as being effective and acceptable based on a quantitative approach. This study was conducted to investigate the feasibility of community-based brucellosis control program using participatory rural appraisals (PRAs) and key-informant interviews. Four PRAs were performed together with livestock farmers and livestock and medical officers in 2017. In the PRAs, qualitative information related to risky behaviors for human infection, human brucellosis symptoms, willingness to sell cattle with experience of abortion, and willingness to pay for calf vaccination were collected, and a holistic approach for a community-based disease control project was planned. All of the communities were willing to implement disease control measures. To avoid human infection, education, especially for children, was proposed to change risky behaviors. The findings of this study showed that community-based disease control measures are promising.
more
Objective: To review the effectiveness of antibiotic stewardship interventions in hospitals in low- and middle-income countries.
The main message emerging from this new comprehensive global assessment is that premature death and disease can be prevented through healthier environments – and to a significant degree. Analysing the latest data on the environment-disease nexus a...nd the devastating impact of environmental hazards and risks on global health, backed up by expert opinion, this report covers more than 100 diseases and injuries.
more
BMJ 2020; 371 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.m3086
Using infectious diseases sensitive to climate as indicators of climate change helps stimulate and inform public health responses
Lancet Planet Health 2020; 4: e271–79
The Scientific Conceptual Framework for Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) provides a scientific foundation for understanding, implementing and monitoring LDN. It has been designed to create a bridge... between the vision and the practical implementation of LDN, by defining LDN in operational terms. The conceptual framework is a product of the UNCCD Science-Policy Interface.
more
In 2015, 26% of the deaths of 5.9 million children who died before reaching their fifth birthday could have been prevented
through addressing environmental risks – a shocking missed opportunity. The prenatal and early childhood period represents
...
a window of particular vulnerability, where environmental hazards can lead to premature birth and other complications,
and increase lifelong disease risk including for respiratory disorders, cardiovascular disease and cancers. The environment
thus represents a major factor in children’s health, as well as a major opportunity for improvement, with effects seen in every
region of the world.
more
Journal of Land Use Science, 16:3, 223-239, DOI: 10.1080/1747423X.2021.1933226
In 2009, WHO’s Second International Conference on Buruli Ulcer Control and Research resolved to strengthen the capacity of national laboratories to confirm cases of the disease, but advised that “efforts are still needed to develop simple diagnostic tools usable in the field as well as disabilit...y prevention methods”.
In 2013, WHO and the Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics convened a meeting of Buruli ulcer experts in Geneva, Switzerland (9) at which two priority unmet needs in diagnosis were identified:
a diagnostic test for early detection of Buruli ulcer in symptomatic patients with sufficient positive predictive value to put patients on appropriate treatment; and
a screening test at the primary health care or community level for symptomatic patients with ulcer
more
The Americas play a critical role in maintaining global food security while
helping to maintain the maximum levels of greenhouse gas concentrations
established by global climate conferences. This document prepared by the
Living Soils of the Ameri...cas initiative presents technologies developed
and implemented in the region that can help in this huge global challenge
that is the preservation of food production and create favorable conditions
for the adaptation and mitigation of climate change through the adoption
of best agricultural practices
more
Front. Vet. Sci., 01 December 2021
This report has been prepared in response to informal requests by SIDS Member States and territories for WHO assistance in confronting the stark and dire situation which climate change has created in their countries and the impact it is having on their peoples
The marathon to eradicate polio is on its final lap: the world is more than 99% of the way to success. After millennia of living with poliovirus and suffering the paralysis it causes, today nearly all the world’s people live in polio-free countries; two of the three strains of wild poliovirus (WPV...) have been eradicated. Some 20 million people are walking who would have been paralysed had it not been for the efforts of national governments and health workers. If eradicating polio has been a marathon, the finishing line is in sight.
more