The objective of Health in the Americas: Overview of the Region of the Americas in the Context of the COVID-19 Pandemic is to respond to the need to address important public health issues in an incr...easingly timely manner, while serving as a platform with a close focus on specific issues of regional importance. This 2022 edition is the second in its new format, providing an overview of the analysis, as well as an in-depth description of the key issues related to COVID-19 in the Region of the Americas. This overview is supported by the Health in the Americas+ virtual platform, which offers interactive resources for data analysis and allows for the comparison of information disaggregated by subregions and countries.
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Results and Lessons Learned from CapacityPlus 2009-2015
The Urban Health Initiative promotes tools and guidance to assess the health impacts of air pollution a...nd the health benefits of sustainable development in energy, transportation, land-use and waste.
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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 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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Under the theme Equity at the Heart of Health, this Plan seeks to catalyze efforts in Member States to reduce inequities in health within and betwe...en countries and territories in order to improve health outcomes. The Plan identifies specific actions to tackle health inequality, including those recommended by the Commission on Equity and Health Inequalities in the Americas, with guidance from the High-level Commission for Universal Health. Four cross-cutting themes are central to this Plan’s approach to addressing the determinants of health: equity, gender, ethnicity, and human rights
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This document focus on the direct consequences of the virus (morbidity and mortality) in specific populations and on the results of measures aimed at mitigating the spread of the virus, with indirec...t impacts on socio-economic conditions. In this complex scenario, the gender approach has not received due attention during the pandemic. Gender is one of the structural determinants of health, but it does not appear in analyses of the direct and indirect effects of the pandemic, despite being essential in the recognition and analysis of the differential impacts on men and women and their interaction with the different determinants of health.
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Over the past few decades and throughout the world, the landscape of adolescent health has been altered dramatically. Currently, the total population of adolescents between the ages of 10 ...s="attribute-to-highlight medbox">and 19 years is 1.2 billion – the largest generation of young people in history. The vast majority of adolescents (85%) live in developing countries where, in many areas, they make up more than a third of the population. They face a variety of different experiences given the diverse political, economic, social and cultural realities within their communities. Although, for many, adolescence is a period of learning and building confidence in a nurturing environment, for others it is a period of heightened risk and complex challenges.
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Induced abortion is permitted in Burkina Faso only to save the life and protect the health of a
pregnant woman, or in cases of rape, incest, and s...evere fetal impairment. As a result, the vast
majority of women who end unintended pregnancies do so in secrecy, out of fear of prosecution
and to avoid the social stigma that surrounds this practice. Most clandestine abortions are carried
out in unsafe conditions that jeopardize women’s health and sometimes their lives. This report
presents estimates of the number and rate of induced abortions that occurred in Burkina Faso in
2008 and 2012; reports levels of unintended pregnancy (the major reason that women seek
abortions in the first place); and describes some of the adverse consequences of unsafe abortion
for women, their families and society.
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DHS Working Papers No. 69
This paper uses data from the three Indian National Family Health Surveys (1992-93, 1998-99, 2005-06) to examine how the relationship between household wealth and chil...d mortality evolved during a time of significant economic change in India. The main predictor is a new measure of household wealth that captures changes in wealth over time. Outcomes include neonatal mortality, postneonatal mortality, child mortality, and under-five mortality. Multivariate analysis is conducted at the national, urban, rural, and regional levels.
Results indicate that the overall relationship between household wealth and mortality weakened over time, as evidenced by the coefficients for under-five mortality at the national level.
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[Preface]. For more than forty years Primary Health Care (PHC) has been recognized as the cornerstone of an effective and responsive health system.... The Alma-Ata Declaration of 1978 reaffirmed the right to the highest attainable level of health, with equity, solidarity and the right to health as its core values. It stressed the need for comprehensive health services, not only curative but services that addressed needs in terms of health promotion, prevention, rehabilitation and treatment of common conditions. A strong resolutive first level of care is the basis for health system development [...] The Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization (PAHO/WHO) has supported the countries in the establishment of interprofessional PHC teams, in the transformation of health education and in building capacity in the strategic planning, and management of human resources for health. Nursing can play a critical role in advancing PHC. New profiles such as the advanced practice nurses, as discussed in this document, can be fundamental in this effort, and in particular, in health promotion, disease prevention and care, especially in rural and underserved areas.
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Lancet Public Health 2018 Published Online September 12, 2018 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/ S2468-2667(18)30138-5
This paper has been prepared to inform discussion at the conference “Beating the DRUM - Domestic Resource Use and Mobilization for accelerating progress towards SDG3,”. Many countries face critical shortfalls in domestic resource use ...="attribute-to-highlight medbox">and mobilization (DRUM) for health, threatening to push health goals out of reach. DRUM failures weaken human capital formation, a vital input to economic growth. Countries need more and better health spending. The first step is to apply already-proven DRUM solutions, adapting them to new contexts. However, in many countries, even the best achievable DRUM performance will not be enough. New solutions are needed, including private-sector engagement and a next generation of DAH. The “Beating the DRUM” conference offers a platform for countries and partners to dialogue and build joint strategy. While each country’s situation is unique, shared lines of action are emerging.
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Levels and Inequities
DHS Further Analysis Reports No. 110
This study shows large variations in maternal health indicators across high-priority counties in Kenya. Nairobi exceeds the natio...nal average on all maternal health indicators in this study, while other highpriority counties consistently are disadvantaged compared with Kenya as a whole in most maternal health indicators. Kisumu exceeds the national average in use of antenatal care, delivery in a health facility, and postnatal care, but not other indicators. Nakuru has fewer women with fertility risk and fewer women who report that the distance they must travel to reach a health facility is a problem.
This study identifies a number of inequities in maternal health indicators across socio-demographic characteristics in the high-priority counties—most in the distribution of delivery care and least in antenatal care. Inequities are also observed in fertility risk and postnatal care.
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Biodiversity and Health in the Face of Climate Change pp 47–66
This chapter reviews the emerging importance of pollen allergies in relation to ongoing climate change. Allergic diseases have been ...increasing in prevalence over the last decades, partly as the result of the impact of climate change. Increased sensitisation rates and more severe symptoms have been the partial outcome of: increased pollen production of wind-pollinated plants resulting in long-term increased abundance of pollen in the air we breathe; earlier shifts of airborne pollen seasons making occurrence of allergic symptoms harder to predict and deal with efficiently; increased allergenicity of pollen causing more severe health effects in allergic individuals; introduction of new, invasive allergenic plant species causing new sensitisations; environment-environment interactions, such as plants and hosted microorganisms, i.e. fungi and bacteria, which comprise a complex and dynamic system, with additive, presently unforeseeable influences on human health; environment-human interactions, as the consequence of a combination of environmental factors, like air pollution, global warming, urbanisation and microclimatic variability, which create a multi-resolution spatiotemporal system that requires new processing technologies and huge data inflow in order to be thoroughly investigated. We suggest that novel, real-time, personalised pollen information services, like mobile-app risk alerts, must be developed to provide the optimum first line of allergy management.
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Afghanistan has one of the largest populations per capita of persons with disabilities in the world. At least one in five Afghan households includes an adult or child with a serious physical, sensory, intellectual, or psychosocial disability. More than 40 years of war have left more than one million... Afghans with amputated limbs and other mobility, visual, or hearing disabilities. Many Afghans have psychosocial disabilities (mental health conditions) such as depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress, which are often a direct result of the protracted conflict. Other Afghans have pre-existing disabilities not directly related to the conflict, such as those caused by polio.
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The Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) Guidelines aim to support healthcare workers improve quality and safety health care. The Guidelines furt...her aim to promote and facilitate the overall goal of IPC by providing evidence-based recommendations on the critical aspects of IPC, focusing on the fundamental principles and priority action areas. All health service organizations should consider the risk of healthcare-associated infection(s) (HAI) and antimicrobial resistance (AMR) transmission to implement these recommendations. The IPC Guidelines also set national standards for the prevention and control of HAIs and to ensure compliance to the National Quality Standards.
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Every day, schools engage in numerous activities that help promote the health and well-being of students, families, and communities. There is clear... evidence of the benefits of the health-promoting schools (HPS) approach, not only for improving overall health outcomes (physical, mental, and social) in the educational community but also for achieving better learning outcomes. The closure of schools during the COVID-19 pandemic highlighted these benefits, as well as the close links between health, wellness, and education.
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This document provides SOPS to ensure appropriate data and information management at health facilities. These SOPs are an updated version of the 2013 SOPs. These SOPs aim to clarify the responsibil...ities and procedures for effective management of aggregated routine health service data
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This document provides countries with recommendations for structuring a public health entomology laboratory network. The document will help countries to identify their areas of need and determine ho...w the entomology network can be strengthened, especially in the context of a decentralized health system. The recommendations also consider the different degrees of development and different entomological research needed to support disease prevention and control activities.
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