Surge in climate change-related disasters poses growing threat to food security
This is the ninth paper in our series, “Community Health Workers at the Dawn of a New Era”. Community health workers (CHWs) are in an intermedi...ary position between the health system and the community. While this position provides CHWs with a good platform to improve community health, a major challenge in large-scale CHW programmes is the need for CHWs to establish and maintain benefcial relationships with both sets of actors, who may have diferent expectations and needs. This paper focuses on the quality of CHW relationships with actors at the local level of the national health system and with communities.
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The COVID-19 pandemic has led to large increases in healthcare waste, straining under resourced healthcare facilities and exacerbating environmental impacts from solid waste. This report quantifies the...an> additional COVID-19 healthcare waste generated, describes current healthcare waste management systems and their deficiencies, and summarizes emerging best practices and solutions to reduce the impact of waste on human and environmental health. The recommendations included in the report build on actions in the WHO manifesto for a healthy recovery from COVID-19: prescriptions and actionables for a healthy and green recovery. They target the global, national and facility levels to promote a “win–win” scenario for COVID-19 PPE use, testing and vaccinations that are safe and support environmental sustainability.
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Atlas of African Health Statistics 2022: Health situation analysis of the WHO African Region
Since 2019, we have been implementing Phase 2 ...lass="attribute-to-highlight medbox">of the regional Transformation Agenda, which informs and aligns with the global WHO Transformation, to ensure WHO is accountable, driven by re- sults and providing value for money in the pursuit of better health. Our global priority in this period is to contribute to delivering on the triple billion targets of expanding universal health coverage, protecting people from emergencies, and promoting health and well-being for people across the Region.
This year’s Atlas of African Health Statistics is being produced in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic that we have been expe- riencing for over two years. The ongoing coronavirus pandemic, together with other health emergencies in the WHO African Re- gion, is yet again testing the strength and resilience of our health systems. Indeed, the impact of COVID-19 is visible in the disruption of services. The report also presents the latest data for more than 50 health-related indicators of the Sustainable Development Goals and WHO’s “triple billion” targets and provides comprehensive country-level statistics using the results chain of the AFRO frame- work of actions for strengthening health systems to achieve UHC and the health-related SDGs.
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Following review of the latest evidence, WHO recommends that TB-LAMP can be used as a replacement for microscopy for the diagnosis ...ribute-to-highlight medbox">of pulmonary TB in adults with signs and symptoms of TB. It can also be considered as a follow-on test to microscopy in adults with signs and symptoms of pulmonary TB, especially when further testing of sputum smear-negative specimens is necessary.
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In the last five years, i.e. how old turned the Campaign “Indifesa” (Defenceless) in 2016, that was launched by Terre des Hommes in 2012, the w...orld has become smaller. One can actually say that the derangements following the Arab Spring in 2011 reshuffled what is stable and what produces instability; between those, who live in a peaceful world, and those, who try to survive in areas affected by violence. All that significantly reduced the distance between those, who live there, along the Mediterranean cost, and those, who live here. Such deep disorder made even more acute, visible and tangible also for the so called developed world all the serious violations of the human rights suffered by little girls and girls: on the one hand the widespread political instability and violence made even more precarious the little girls and young women’s conditions on the Mediterranean southern coast, where they were already fragile; and on the other hand the migration flows further worsened them, matching at the same time the conditions of those young and very young migrants to those of the European girls of the same age.
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Access to health workers who are fit for purpose, motivated and protected is a fundamental force of health service delivery and the achievement of ...universal health coverage and the health and health-related Sustainable Development Goals. Data and knowledge of the distribution, skill mix and future development needs of the health workforce can mean the difference between enabling or impeding health systems performance, inclusive economic growth and global health security preparedness and response
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Aerosol pollutants are known to raise the risk of development of non-communicable respiratory diseases (NCRDs) such as asthma, chronic bronchitis, ...chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and allergic rhinitis. Sub-Saharan Africa’s rapid pace of urbanization, economic expansion, and population growth raise concerns of increasing incidence of NCRDs. This research characterizes the state of research on pollution and NCRDs in the 46 countries of Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). This research systematically reviewed the literature on studies of asthma; chronic bronchitis; allergic rhinitis; and air pollutants such as particulate matter, ozone, NOx, and sulfuric oxide.
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Community health nurses have the potential to make significant contributions to meet the health care needs of various population groups in a variet...y of community settings. In order to assess the extent to which CHNs are achieving this potential, WHO conducted a study between 2010 and 2014 that examined the status of community health nursing in 22 countries, 13 of which were experiencing a critical shortage of health care workers. The study revealed that the countries surveyed had the basic and operational framework for optimizing CHN in their health systems as evidenced by the availability of PHC structures to guide interventions. However, challenges were identified related to the education, practice and management of CHNs in these countries. The major challenges identified were: Limited availability of career opportunities; poor worker retention; low recognition for CHNs; inadequate and unsupportive working conditions and environments; absence of educational standards; varying educational entry-level requirements for CHN programmes; and a lack of consensus on the scope of practice for CHNs.
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The failure to protect the people most vulnerable to climate change is especially alarming given the steady increase in ...ighlight medbox">the number of climate and weather-related disasters. According to the World Disasters Report, the average number of climate and weather-related disasters per decade has increased nearly 35 per cent since the 1990s.
Over the past decade, 83 per cent of all disasters were caused by extreme weather and climate-related events such as floods, storms, and heatwaves. Together, these disasters killed more than 410,000 people and affected a staggering 1.7 billion people.
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The Global Movement for Mental Health has brought renewed attention to the neglect of people with mental illness within health policy worldwide. ...pan class="attribute-to-highlight medbox">The maltreatment of the mentally ill in many low-income countries is widely reported within psychiatric hospitals, informal healing centres, and family homes. International agencies have called for the development of legislation and policy to address these abuses. However such initiatives exemplify a top-down approach to promoting human rights which historically has had limited impact at the level of those living with mental illness and their families.
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FAO’s component of the Global COVID-19 Humanitarian Response Plan
18.5.2020
A wide range of potential enablers and barriers were identified for influencing progress for the scale-up of severe wasting services within nationa...l health systems. Findings were categorised according to the six pillars of WHO’s health system strengthening framework.
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This report reviews the current situation in relation to national capacity to address NCDs and the progress made at country level over the past dec...ade. It highlights that, while progress is being made, there is still much work to be done to create the infrastructure, policies, surveillance and health systems response that will allow NCDs and their contributing risk factors to be successfully contained and reversed.
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Ensuring healthy lives and promoting well-being for all is possible – but only if economically better-off and disadvantaged countries play their part
January 2020 to December 2021