Key highlights from January to April 2020 (Syria situation)
Across the MENA region, UNHCR is receiving alarming reports of increasing mental health issues among the forcibly displaced. Mental health...> and psychosocial support (MHPSS) activities are being stepped up by UNHCR and partners to address this new dangerous trend.
more
May 2020 International Journal of Infectious Diseases 96 DOI: 10.1016/j.ijid.2020.05.003
Men are less likely than women to seek help for mental health issues and are much more likely to commit suicide. This scoping review examined recent evidence published in English ...ute-to-highlight medbox">and Russian on the role of socially constructed masculinity norms in men’s help-seeking behaviour for mental health issues. The key sociocultural barriers to men’s help-seeking pertaining to masculinity norms were identified as self-reliance, difficulty in expressing emotions and self-control.
more
Recently, a renewed interest in large-scale community health worker (CHW) programs has been seen globally. This renewal provides an opportune moment to take stock of issues and challenges such progr...ams face and what can be done to make them as effective as possible. With this in mind, this manual is intended to be used a practical guide for policymakers and program
managers wishing to develop or strengthen a CHW program, drawing lessons from other countries that have implemented CHW programs at-scale. Throughout, we discuss major policy and programmatic issues that decision-makers and planners need to consider when designing, implementing, scaling up or strengthening a national-level CHW program. We offer an overview
of specific challenges CHW programs face, country lessons, tools, and other resources that may be helpful, while incorporating relevant programmatic examples as much as possible.
more
For the purpose of this document, Interprofessional is defined as: Multiple health disciplines with diverse knowledge and skills who share an integrated set of goals ...ght medbox">and who utilize interdependent collaboration that involves communication, sharing of knowledge and coordination of services to provide services to patients/clients and their care-giving systems. This best practice guideline, Developing and Sustaining Interprofessional Health Care: Optimizing patients/clients, organizational, and system outcomes is intended to foster healthy work environments. The focus in developing this guideline was identifying attributes of interprofessional care that will optimize quality outcomes for patients/clients, providers, teams, the organization and the system. This guideline identifies best practices to enable, enhance and sustain teamwork and interprofessional collaboration, and to enhance positive outcomes for patients/clients, systems and organizations. It is based on the best available evidence; where evidence was limited, the recommendations were based on the consensus of expert opinion.
more
Urbanization, land use, global trade and industrialization have led to profound and negative impacts on nature, biodiversity and ecosystems across ...the world. The ongoing depletion of natural resources not only afects environmental conditions but also has an enormous impact on the well-being and security of societies.
This report provides an overview of the impacts of the natural environment on human health. It presents the ways nature and ecosystems can support and protect health and well-being, and describes how nature degradation and loss of biodiversity can threaten human health.
more
The Knowledge Guide provides guidance on how health workers can apply the Standards to their own practice. For each of the nine competencies and their specific behaviours in the Standards, the Knowl...edge Guide examines in detail how a health worker's knowledge, skills and attitudes can reach the stated benchmark for providing people-centred health services to refugees and migrants. The Knowledge Guide also details the learning outcomes that reflect the behaviours that a health worker will demonstrate once they have achieved the Competency Standards.
The Knowledge Guide is designed for educators and health workers to assist in designing or integrating learning content to enable attainment of the identified knowledge, skills and attitudes.
more
This publication presents the Agenda for the Americas on Health, Environment, and Climate Change 2021–2030 (the Agenda). The Agenda is a call to action to the ...edbox">health sector to lead the charge to address environmental determinants of health in the Americas. The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) will work with Member States to achieve its goal and objective to ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages using a sustainable and equitable approach that places a priority on reducing health inequity. The Agenda has been developed under the umbrella of the WHO Global Strategy on Health, Environment, and Climate Change, and builds upon the commitments set forth in the Sustainable Health Agenda for the Americas 2018–2030 and the PAHO Strategic Plan 2020–2025. The Agenda was developed in consultation with the Technical Advisory Group and through a consensus-driven decision-making process with Member States during the 2019–2020 period. Looking toward the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 3, the Agenda focuses on: improving the performance of environmental public health programs and institutions; fostering environmentally resilient and sustainable health systems; and promoting environmentally healthy and resilient cities and communities. Its implementation will be context-specific, based on the needs and realities of the countries. It will benefit countries and territories by promoting good governance practices, strengthening the leadership and coordination roles of the health sector, fostering cross-sectoral action, focusing on primary prevention, and enhancing evidence and communication. It will facilitate access to human, technical, and financial resources necessary to address environmental determinants of health and ensure that the Region is fully engaged in global health, environment, and climate change processes and agreements. The objective of the Agenda is to strengthen the capacity of health actors in the health and non-health sectors to address and adapt to environmental determinants of health (EDHs), prioritizing populations living in conditions of vulnerability, in order to meet Outcome 18 of the PAHO Strategic Plan 2020–2025 directly and several other outcomes of the Plan indirectly. To address and adapt to the challenges of EDHs in the Region, an integrated and evidence-informed approach within the health sector and across sectors will be needed, one enabled, and supported by good governance practices, adequate management mechanisms, high-level political will, and adequate human, technical, technological, and financial resources.
more
Compared with other health areas, the mental health impacts of climate change have received less research attention. The literature on climate change and<.../span> mental health is growing rapidly but is characterised by several limitations and research gaps. In a field where the need for designing evidence-based adaptation strategies is urgent, and research gaps are vast, implementing a broad, all-encompassing research agenda will require some strategic focus.
more
Addressing gaps and improving health system performance is simply not enough to prepare a health system to tackle the effects of the climate crisis.... Climate change’s impact on the health and well-being of people globally is reaching catastrophic levels. As the earth continues to warm, tens of millions of people are at increased risk from rapid and unpredictable spread of infectious diseases, heatwaves, water and food insecurity and scarcity, air pollution, poverty and homelessness. Health services are often regarded as a first line defense in preventing adverse health outcomes, especially from those caused by climate impacts
more
This thematic brief accompanies the Working for Health 2022–2030 Action Plan, serving as a background and rationale to the related actions of the Working for ...dbox">Health progression model (see Annex). The brief aims to inform Member States, nonstate actors and other users of the Action Plan on the context of health and care workforce education and employment, including the relevant policy landscape, key challenges and future directions.
In doing so, it provides an expanded exploration of the themes beyond what is provided in the Action Plan itself and reflects the topical issues and considerations that shaped its design, including those issues identified in the Seventy-fourth World Health Assembly Resolution WHA74.14 to protect, safeguard and invest in the health and care workforce. The importance of these themes was again emphasized at the Seventy-fifth World Health Assembly, when Resolution WHA75.17: Human resources for health was co-sponsored by over 100 Member States, calling for the adoption and implementation of the Working for Health 2022–2030 Action Plan and utilization of the related Global Health and Care Worker Compact.
more
Africa is off track to reach the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030 and lags behind in building resilient health systems
and ...bute-to-highlight medbox">health security, against 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.
more
In sum, the goal is to understand the need to increase fiscal space for health as a prerequisite, but within the framework of efforts to transform the health system. These changes should foster equi...table and efficient expenditures and create or strengthen comprehensive integrated health systems with a first level of care capable of solving health problems and coordinating networks, based on a primary health care approach that offers not only curative care but also health promotion and disease prevention services.
more
WHO/Europe has launched a new guide, providing support to countries on how to apply behavioural and cultural insights (BCI) for health. It presents a simple step-wise approach, complemented by a ric...h collection of detailed considerations, tools and exercises. The guide is the first of its kind, specifically developed for use by public health professionals developing policies, services and communications informed by BCI across health topics.
Some of the most persistent public health challenges involve human behaviour. Using a BCI lens means that health policies, services and communications can be tailored to the needs and circumstances of people and communities, and thereby help combat these challenges. The new Tailoring Health Programmes (THP) guide describes how this can be done.
Building on several topic-specific guides that focused on applying BCI to routine and influenza vaccination and tackling antimicrobial resistance, as well as external evaluations and a rigorous peer-review process, this guide is the result of over a decade of work by WHO/Europe. The THP approach has already been adopted in over 20 countries and has received positive feedback from public health agencies.
“This guide is the culmination of a decade of work involving many colleagues at country, regional and global levels. The guide is our “BCI bible”, guiding our work with and in countries to help tackle persistent health challenges,” said Katrine Bach Habersaat, Regional Advisor for BCI at WHO/Europe.
Karina Godoy, Senior Analyst and National Focal Point for Behavioural Insights at the Public Health Agency of Sweden, who is employing the approach described in the guide across several health projects, comments: “The THP guide is easy to use and at the same time provides detailed guidance and inspiration where needed. We have decided to translate the document into Swedish and use the approach widely”.
more
This document provides a list of key WHO-recommended maternal and newborn health commodities and aims to accelerate progress towards the SDGs. It c...onsolidates the key and enabling commodities from existing WHO guidelines on maternal and newborn health.
more
This document is for humanitarian health actors working at national and sub-national level in countries facing humanitarian emergencies. It applies to Hea...lth Cluster partners, including governmental and non-governmental health service providers.
Based on the IASC Guidelines on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Emergency Settings (IASC, 2007), it gives an overview of essential knowledge that humanitarian health actors should have about mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) in humanitarian emergencies.
This document by the IASC Reference Group for Mental Health and Psychosocial Support was developed in consultation with the IASC Global Health Cluster.
more
Lunsar, Port Loko District, Sierra Leone