La thèse de Yobouet Inès Kouakou, soutenue à l’Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1, porte sur le traitement d’urgence du paludisme sévère chez l’enfant à l’aide d’une administration intranasale d’artésunate. L’objectif principal de ce travail est d’explorer, in vitro, la voie na...sale comme alternative à la voie intra-rectale recommandée actuellement en pré-hospitalier. L’étude démontre la non-toxicité de formulations d’artésunate sur un modèle de muqueuse nasale humaine, bien que la perméation observée reste faible. Des pistes sont proposées pour améliorer cette perméation, notamment par l’optimisation galénique. La thèse inclut également une revue de la pharmacocinétique de l’artésunate et le développement de méthodes de dosage simples et peu coûteuses, adaptées aux laboratoires à ressources limitées. Ce travail s’inscrit dans une démarche de lutte contre le paludisme, notamment en zones rurales où l’accès aux soins reste difficile.
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Zambia has completed the implementation of the National TB Strategic Plan (2017-2021) that set in motion the TB elimination agenda in Zambia through coordinated and accelerated TB response. During this period, the National TB and Leprosy Programme (NTLP) registered tremendous success.
The NTLP is ...poised to attain the ambitious goal pronounced by the government of eliminating TB by 2030, in line with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the World Health Organization End TB Strategy. The programme exponentially increased TB notifications from as low as 35,922 people with TB in 2018 to 40,726 in 2020 and in 2021 the TB notifications rose to 50,825 (a 25% increase against 2020 performance). The NTLP also registered incredible success in sustaining high TB Preventive Treatment (TPT) initiations among persons living with HIV and a high TB treatment success rate among drug-susceptible TB cases. New and relapse TB notifications in children below 15 years increased by 43%, from 2,724 in 2020 to 3,890 in 2021. TB notifications ratio between children aged 0-4 and 5-14 was 0.9, an improvement from what we achieved in 2018 (the ratio was 0.7). The proportion of TB patients who are HIV positive continued to decrease, reaching 34% in 2021 from 39% in 2020. Sustained increases in TB notifications, treatment success rate, and TPT initiations have resulted in a rapid decrease in the TB incidence rate that reached 307 per 100,000 population in 2021 against a rate of 391 in 2015.
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The Social and Behaviour Change Communication (SBCC) Strategy for the Prevention of the Re-establishment of Malaria Transmission in Timor-Leste forms part of the National Strategic Plan (NSP) for 2021–2025. The strategy aims to support Timor-Leste's efforts to sustain malaria elimination by promot...ing responsive and preventive behaviours through targeted communication and community engagement. Created in collaboration with the Ministry of Health, the WHO, the Global Fund and other stakeholders, the SBCC strategy implements recommendations from the 2020 external review of the National Malaria Programme. Building on previous BCC initiatives (2015–2020), it emphasises surveillance, diagnosis, treatment and vector control, particularly focusing on vulnerable populations. The SBCC strategy provides partners and implementers with a dynamic guide to designing context-specific communication interventions that support malaria elimination and prevent the re-establishment of transmission.
Accessed on 18/06/2025.
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The National Strategic Plan for Malaria Elimination 2021–2025 outlines Bangladesh’s roadmap to achieve zero indigenous malaria cases by 2030, with an interim goal to reduce transmission to near-zero levels by 2025. The strategy builds upon earlier successes in malaria control and shifts focus to...ward elimination in both high- and low-endemic areas.
The plan emphasizes five core objectives: ensuring universal access to quality malaria prevention and treatment services, strengthening surveillance and case detection systems, improving vector control through long-lasting insecticidal nets (LLINs) and indoor residual spraying (IRS), building community engagement, and enhancing program governance and accountability.
High-priority districts, especially in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, are targeted for intensified interventions, including active case detection and tailored outreach to mobile and vulnerable populations. The strategy also calls for robust health systems support, cross-border collaboration, and integration of malaria services into broader primary health care.
This document serves as Bangladesh’s strategic foundation to transition from malaria control to phased elimination, in line with national and global targets.
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The 2022 report reviews the global malaria diagnostics market and technological landscape to support Unitaid’s 2023–2027 strategy for quality malaria case management. The report highlights the stalled progress of malaria control efforts, the gaps in access to diagnostics and the public health im...plications of P. falciparum HRP2/3 gene deletions, which compromise the accuracy of the widely used HRP2-detecting rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs). The report analyses the malaria RDT market, noting supplier diversification, price trends and production shifts resulting from the pandemic. It also addresses the emerging point-of-care G6PD testing market, which is required to ensure the safe radical cure of P. vivax infections. It surveys technological innovation, including digital microscopy, hemozoin tests, nucleic acid detection and biosensors, while emphasising that RDTs and microscopy will remain the mainstay of case management in the near term. The report identifies market shortcomings, access barriers and opportunities to improve malaria case management and diagnostic coverage.
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The African Palliative Care Association is pleased to publish the first edition of Palliative Care Standards for Africa. The development of these standards was achieved through wide consultation with service beneficiaries and providers, and they have been developed to suit different levels of ... service delivery, from primary to tertiary. These standards are underpinned by the World Health Organization’s definition of palliative care, and recognise that scaling up palliative care requires a public health approach with four pillars: policy, education, drug availability and implementation. In addition, the increasing need to establish specific indicators of quality and effectiveness for palliative care has been a big driving force behind these comprehensive standards. It is APCA’s wish that they will provide a framework for the development of evaluation
and performance indicators that can facilitate programme improvement and development. The standards are designed to allow the development or improvement of palliative care across the different services levels, within the organisational capacity of various service providers. They describe a relationship between primary, intermediary and tertiary level service providers, with expectations for all providers articulated through detailed criteria for each standard. It is therefore expected that these standards will influence the planning and delivery of palliative care services at all levels of health care service delivery.
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Очень часто дети это уязвимая под-группа внутри уже уязвимых групп населения. Поэтому необходимо, чтобы политики, гражданское общество и медицинские работники без...отлагательно обратили свое внимание на проблему борьбы с детским туберкулезом. Дети являются источником развития заболеваний в будущем, а продолжающееся бездействие приводит к потере многих человеческих жизней.
Accessed on 19.07. 2019
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This paper looks at the status of tuberculosis (TB) advocacy
communication and social mobilization (ACSM) activities in selected
national TB control programmes in the WHO African Region. The
findings are from an assessment of TB ACSM activities in Ghana, Kenya,
Lesotho, Malawi and South Africa.
...
Disease control, issue 15
The African health monitor
Accessed November 2017
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Module 2
Community Educators and Advocates
July 2017
Module 2: Community educators and advocates. Community educators and advocates are needed to increase awareness about PrEP in their communities. This module provides information on PrEP that should be considered in community-led activities ...that aim to increase knowledge about PrEP and generate demand and access.
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The new treatment recommendations that extend the 2018 treat all recommendation for adults with chronic HCV infection to include adolescents and children down to 3 years, and to align the existing recommended pangenotypic direct-acting antiviral (DAA) regimens (SOF/DCV, SOF/VEL and G/P) for adults, ...to those for adolescents and children. This alignment is expected to simplify procurement, promote access to treatment among children in low- and middle-income countries and contribute to global efforts to eliminate the disease
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Long-term polio vaccine security – the timely, sustained, and uninterrupted supply of suitable types of affordable, quality-assured polio vaccines – is essential in the global effort to achieve and maintain a polio free world. However, fragmented approaches and short-term planning pose considera...ble challenges to securing long-term polio vaccine security.
This framework is designed to enhance the efforts of existing structures and workstreams within the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) and other stakeholders by improving communication and coordination on vaccine security. Ensuring vaccine security is crucial for maintaining a timely, sustained, and uninterrupted supply of affordable, quality-assured polio vaccines in the global fight to achieve and sustain a polio-free world. However, challenges such as fragmented approaches, short-term planning, a dynamic policy environment, and a diverse product pipeline present significant risks to long-term vaccine security. This framework emphasizes the need for alignment and coordination across key polio operational domains, including Poliovirus Containment, Research and Development, and Vaccine Manufacturing and Supply. It also underscores the critical role of normative frameworks and policies in shaping long-term vaccine strategies that guide these operational areas. Additionally, it highlights the importance of cross-cutting elements such as financing and access to resources, along with the integration of communication, coordination, and advocacy efforts, as essential enablers for achieving vaccine security. To secure long-term vaccine supply, it is imperative to enhance alignment and strengthen coordinated efforts across workstreams and with stakeholders, including vaccine manufacturers.
Recognizing that vaccine security is an ongoing endeavor, requiring continuous monitoring and adaptation, this framework will undergo regular updates and revisions. Initially, the management of the framework will be carried out by the GPEI Vaccine Supply Group (VSG).
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Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of global deaths, with the majority occurring in low- and middle-income countries (LMIC). The primary and secondary prevention of CVD is suboptimal throughout the world, but the evidence-practice gaps are much more pronounced in LMIC. Barriers at the... patient, health-care provider, and health system level prevent the implementation of optimal primary and secondary prevention. Identification of the particular barriers that exist in resource-constrained settings is necessary to inform effective strategies to reduce the identified evidence-practice gaps. Furthermore, targeting modifiable factors that contribute most significantly to the global burden of CVD, including tobacco use, hypertension, and secondary prevention for CVD will lead to the biggest gains in mortality reduction. We review a select number of novel, resource-efficient strategies to reduce premature mortality from CVD, including: (1) effective measures for tobacco control; (2) implementation of simplified screening and management algorithms for those with or at risk of CVD, (3) increasing the availability and affordability of simplified and cost-effective treatment regimens including combination CVD preventive drug therapy, and (4) simplified delivery of health care through task-sharing (non-physician health workers) and optimizing self-management (treatment supporters). Developing and deploying systems of care that address barriers related to the above, will lead to substantial reductions in CVD and related mortality.
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4th edition
The WHO Laboratory Biosafety Manual (LBM) has been in broad use at all levels of clinical and public health laboratories, and other biomedical sectors globally, serving as a de facto global standard that presents best practices and sets trends in biosafety.
LBM encouraged countries t...o accept and implement basic concepts in biological safety and to develop national codes of practice for the safe handling of biological agents in laboratories within their geographical borders.
This fourth edition of the manual builds on the risk assessment framework introduced in the third edition. A thorough, evidence-based and transparent assessment of the risks allows safety measures to be balanced with the actual risk of working with biological agents on a case-by-case basis.
This novel evidence- and risk-based approach will allow optimised resource use and sustainable laboratory biosafety and biosecurity policies and practices that are relevant to their individual circumstances and priorities, enabling equitable access to clinical and public health laboratory tests and biomedical research opportunities without compromising safety.
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Countries around the world are facing the challenge of increased demand for care of people with COVID-19, compounded by fear, misinformation and limitations on movement that disrupt the delivery of health care for all conditions. Maintaining essential health services: operational guidance for the CO...VID-19 context recommends practical actions that countries can take at national, subregional and local levels to reorganize and safely maintain access to high-quality, essential health services in the pandemic context. It also outlines sample indicators for monitoring essential health services, and describes considerations on when to stop and restart services as COVID-19 transmission recedes and surges.
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The Practical manual on laboratory strengthening, 2022 update provides practical guidance on implementation of WHO recommendations and best practices for TB laboratory strengthening. It is an updated version of the GLI Practical Guide to Laboratory Strengthening published in 2017 and provides the la...test practical guidance on use of newly recommended diagnostics as well as guidance in key technical areas, including quality assurance and quality management systems, specimen collection and registration, procurement and supply-chain management, diagnostic connectivity, biosafety, data management, human resources, strategic planning, and model algorithms. The key changes are:
inclusion of recent or updated WHO recommendations for tests to diagnose TB and detect drug resistance;
alignment with the latest WHO critical concentrations for phenotypic drug-susceptibility testing (DST) and the new definitions of pre-XDR-TB and XDR-TB;
updated information on building quality-assured TB testing and management capacity using the Stepwise Laboratory Quality Improvement Process Towards Accreditation (SLIPTA) approach (Score-TB package1);
updated information on assessing, analysing and optimising TB diagnostic networks; and
updated information on the use of next-generation sequencing (NGS) to detect mutations associated with drug resistance for surveillance purposes.
The document also provides references to resources and tools relevant for work on laboratory strengthening.
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Background
Asthma education, a key component of long-term asthma management, is challenging in resource-limited settings with shortages of clinical staff. Task-shifting educational roles to lay (non-clinical) staff is a potential solution. We conducted a randomised controlled trial of an enhanced a...sthma care intervention for children in Malawi, which included reallocation of asthma education tasks to lay-educators. In this qualitative sub-study, we explored the experiences of asthmatic children, their families and lay-educators, to assess the acceptability, facilitators and barriers, and perceived value of the task-shifting asthma education intervention.
Methods
We conducted six focus group discussions, including 15 children and 28 carers, and individual interviews with four lay-educators and a senior nurse. Translated transcripts were coded independently by three researchers and key themes identified.
Results
Prior to the intervention, participants reported challenges in asthma care including the busy and sometimes hostile clinical environment, lack of access to information and the erratic supply of medication. The education sessions were well received: participants reported greater understanding of asthma and their treatment and confidence to manage symptoms. The lay-educators appreciated pre-intervention training, written guidelines, and access to clinical support. Low education levels among carers presented challenges, requiring an open, non-critical and individualised approach.
Discussion
Asthma education can be successfully delivered by lay-educators with adequate training, supervision and support, with benefits to the patients, their families and the community. Wider implementation could help address human resource shortages and support progress towards Universal Health Coverage.
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This country cooperation strategy (CCS) outlines how the World Health Organization (WHO) will work with the Lao People’s Democratic Republic over the next five years (2024–2028), supporting the implementation of the five-year health sector development plans and the Health Sector Reform Strategy ...2021–2030 to attain the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030.
The Lao People’s Democratic Republic experienced substantial economic growth in the 30 years prior to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, contributing to reduced poverty and significant progress toward the SDGs. However, the COVID-19 pandemic brought this development to a halt. It was anticipated that the COVID-19 recovery and the tremendous population growth in recent years would provide opportunities for a shift toward more sustainable and inclusive development in the years ahead. In 2023, however, the contrary was the case. Rural residents, including many ethnic minorities, continued to face marginalization because of limited access to education, health care and economic opportunities.
Despite the challenges of COVID-19 and other disease outbreaks, the country has made significant improvements in health. Nonetheless, progress has been uneven and not everyone has benefited from these achievements. In the mountainous region, many people lack access to quality health care because of the unequal distribution of well-trained health-care workers. Preventable deaths due to poor-quality health care for children and newborns, infants and mothers remain a concern, as do communicable diseases such as sexually transmitted infections and tuberculosis. The increasing burden of noncommunicable diseases and the health impact of worsening climate change further heighten the need for strengthened and resilient health systems, which are at risk due to an underfunded health sector and weak economy.
This CCS aims to address remaining and future challenges as well as health needs while creating an impact that is sustainable. It identifies three strategic priorities and nine deliverables (Table 1) to support the attainment of the national vision of Health for all by all, as articulated in the 9th Health Sector Development Plan 2021–2025. It contributes to the country’s goals to achieve universal health coverage, graduate from least developed country status by 2026 and attain SDGs by 2030.
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In this entry we are looking at smoking, alcohol consumption and the use of illicit drugs. We are studying who is using these substances, how their use has changed over time, and we are presenting the estimates of their impact on health. Collectively, smoking, alcohol and illicit drug use kills 11.8... million people each year. This is more than the number of deaths from all cancers
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The international community sits at the tipping pointof a post-‐antibiotic era, where common bacterial infections are no longer treatable with the antibiotic armamentarium that exists. In South Africa, t...he identification of the first case of pan-‐resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae(Brink et al, J Clin Microbiol. 2013;51(1):369-‐72) marks a watershed moment and highlights ourtip of the antibiotic resistance ‘iceberg’ in this country. Multi-‐drug resistant (MDR)-‐bacterial infections, predominantly in Gram-‐negative bacteria such as Klebsiella pneumoniae, Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosaand Acinetobacter baumanniiare now commonplace in South African hospitals. Whilst a number of expensive new antibiotics for Gram-‐positive bacterial infections have been manufactured recently (some of which are licenced for usein South Africa), no new antibiotics active against Gram-‐negative infections are expected in the next 10-‐15years. Hence what we have now, needs conserving
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