PLoS Neglected Tropical diseases August 16, 2021 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0009697
Chagas disease, also known as American trypanosomiasis, is a neglected tropical disease transmitted by triatomine insects, first identified in 1909. Chagas disease affects approximately 6–7 million peop...le globally and is highly prevalent in Latin America where most cases are reported. However, there is increasing evidence that Chagas disease is now an important public health issue outside the “classical” endemic countries due to population migration. Our understanding of Chagas disease, including its pathologies and factors relating to progression, remains to date limited, and is also challenged by lack of diagnosis and highly effective treatment. This systematic review aims to describe studies with Chagas patients receiving antiparasitic treatment. Databases were searched for relevant studies published after 1997, and the results of these searches were screened.
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Working Document Nov. 2020
The COVAX Supply and Logistics workstream lead by UNICEF, Gavi and WHO have released a working copy of the COVID-19 Vaccination, Country Readiness & Delivery: Supply and Logistics Guidance. Countries might find this Guide useful when developing and strengthening their sup...ply chain strategies to receive, store, distribute and manage the COVID-19 vaccines and their ancillary products, in line with their national deployment and vaccination plan (NDVP). The document also provides links to the different tools and resources to aid countries in performing assessment, planning and capacity-building activities.
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Module 1q
PrEP users
July 2017
Module 11: PrEP users. This module provides information for people who are interested in taking PrEP to reduce their risk of acquiring HIV and people who are already taking PrEP – to support them in their choice and use of PrEP. This module gives ideas for cou...ntries and organizations implementing PrEP to help them develop their own tools.
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DHS Further Analysis Reports No. 109 - This report documents trends in key child nutrition indicators in Rwanda. Data from the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) in 2005, 2010, and 2014-15 were analyzed, disaggregated by selected equity-related variables, and tested for trends. Over the survey per...iod, Rwanda had high rates of exclusive breastfeeding, with regional variation. Rates of continued breastfeeding were also high but generally decreased as mother’s education and household wealth increased in all survey years. Complementary feeding practices varied by region, mother’s education, household wealth, urban-rural residence, and sex of the child.
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Globally, the cancer burden is rising, exerting significant strain on
populations and health systems at all levels of income. There are
concerted efforts towards enhancing access to comprehensive
cancer prevention and control initiatives.
Climate change is a major risk to good development outcomes, and the World Bank Group is committed to playing an important role in helping countries integrate climate action into their core development agendas. The World Bank Group is committed to supporting client countries to invest in and build a... low-carbon, climate-resilient future, helping them to be better prepared to adapt to current and future climate impacts
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One approach to development assistance for health, or health aid, emphasizes the ex ante selection of cost-effective health interventions, an approach that began with the World Development Report (1993) on Investing in Health and has since been adopted by the Effective Altruism community. But just h...ow much of health aid is cost-effective? In this paper, we examine projects in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Creditor Reporting System, the standard dataset that measures and characterizes development assistance for health, for the
years 2019 to 2021, and count the number of projects that refer to interventions from a list of highly cost-effective interventions as defined by the Disease Control Priorities Project, third edition. This exploratory quantitative analysis indicates that 61% of projects used a key word/phrase of a costeffective intervention. There were 11.9 interventions mapped per project on average. There is little evidence that donors tailor the set of interventions to country income levels by cost-effectiveness.
Policymakers may benefit from reviewing the full portfolio of interventions covered by domestic and external resources.
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This report examines the support to private healthcare provision in India by the World Bank’s private sector arm, the International Finance Corporation (IFC). Despite supporting private healthcare in the country since 1997, no healthcare results for lending and investments have been disclosed sinc...e the start of these operations over twenty-five years ago. The IFC has overwhelmingly invested in high-end urban hospitals which are out of reach for the majority of Indians. Several have consistently failed to provide free healthcare to poor patients despite this being a condition under which free or subsidized public land was allotted to these hospitals. Supporting private healthcare in a context where 37% of Indians experience catastrophic health expenditures in private hospitals appears to run counter to the World Bank Group’s focus on poverty reduction. These investments do not contribute to the building of stronger healthcare infrastructure or respond to unmet healthcare needs. Only 14% of IFC-financed hospitals are located in the 10 states ranked lowest in terms of the overall performance of the health system. Furthermore, we found many instances where regulators upheld complaints pertaining to violations of patients’ rights by these hospitals including overcharging, denial of healthcare, price rigging, financial conflict of interest and medical negligence.
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The emergence of multifrug-resistant malaria in the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) has been identified as an emergency issue that may have catastrophic consequences on the future of malaria elimination in the GMS as well as globally. In recognition of the need for a cohesive regional response,... GMS countries have committed to a shared goal of eliminating malaria from the GMS by 2030 working within the framework of the Strategy for Malaria Elimination in the Greater Mekong Subregion 2015-2030. Population mobility has been identified as a key concern in the context of multidrug-resistant malaria; and in a region of highly porous borders where the majority of intra-Mekong migration occurs through informal channels, addressing the health needs of migrant populations has never been more critical.
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The document presents an assessment developed by both institutions as a contribution to the prioritization of education in national response plans to the health emergency and future recovery strategies. "Countries have deployed various response and recovery plans in which education needs to be incor...porated as a central element," the report says, "not only to ensure an education response, but to achieve an equitable, inclusive and sustainable recovery”.
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Significant progress has been made in the eradication of three priority diseases in the African Region, as a result of extensive collaboration between the Regional Office, WHO country offices and countries. For example, in August 2020, the region was certified free of wild poliovirus. In the area of... neglected tropical diseases, Guinea worm disease is on the verge of eradication, and 12 member states are within reach of being certified as having eradicated yaws by the end of this year.
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We investigate whether and to what extent Chinese development finance affects infant mortality, combining 92 demographic and health surveys (DHS) for a maximum of 53 countries and almost 55,000 sub-national locations over the 2002-2014 period. We address causality by instrumenting aid with a set of ...interacted variables. Variation over
time results from indicators that measure the availability of funding in a given year. Cross-sectional variation results from a sub-national region’s “probability to receive aid.” Controlled for this probability in tandem with fixed effects for country-years and provinces, the interactions of these variables form powerful and excludable instruments. Our results show that Chinese aid increases infant mortality at sub-national scales, but decreases mortality at the countrylevel. In several tests, we show that this stark contrast likely results from aid being fungible within recipient countries.
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This Mpox SPRP Global Monitoring & Evaluation (M&E) Framework, also referred to as the Framework, aims to monitor and report on global progress towards these objectives, including information about country-level response efforts and WHO support to Member States. Regular collection and analysis of da...ta on these objectives, alongside the ongoing tracking of the epidemiological situation, are key to informing decision-making, operational adjustments, as well as ensuring transparency and accountability for achieving the goal to stop the Mpox outbreak. This document suggests reporting indicators for monitoring of the global response to the Mpox PHEIC as articulated in the Mpox SPRP and Operational Planning Guidelines for countries.
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The crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated preexisting structural economic inequalities, and had a disproportionate impact on informal workers, especially on women and young people, who lost jobs and income. The situation was even more difficult for single-parent households led by women,... who also had to endure more housework and care tasks. As shown by various research studies, the asymmetric distribution of care tasks, taken up by women, is an inequality factor.
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It is too early to know the full impact of COVID-19 on Africa. To date the experience has been varied. There are causes for concern, but also reasons for hope. Early estimates were pessimistic regarding the pandemic’s impact on the continent. But the relatively low numbers of COVID-19 cases report...ed thus far have raised hopes that African countries may be spared the worst of the pandemic. While the virus is present in all African countries, most countries have recorded fewer than 1,000 cases. The African Union acted swiftly, endorsing a joint continental strategy in February, and complementing efforts by Member States and Regional Economic Communities by providing a public health platform.
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Ebola disease and Marburg disease outbreaks continue to occur in Africa, with increased frequency. In addition to resulting in high mortality and morbidity, the outbreaks generate fear and mistrust about the response activities within the communities affected.
Infection prevention and control (IP...C) is a key pillar in the outbreak response; adherence to IPC practices can prevent and control transmission of infections to health and care workers, patients and their family members.
During the 2014-2016 West African Ebola disease outbreak, there was an urgent need for rapid IPC guidance to help support ministries of health, health-care providers and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). In response, WHO produced several documents related to the outbreak based on expert opinion, including IPC-specific documents and documents on clinical management that also referenced key IPC principles and practices. Since that time, many practices in the field have become institutionalized.
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Review of International, Regional and National Policies and Legal Frameworks that Promote Migrants and Mobile Populations' Access to Health and Malaria Services in the Greater Mekong Subregion (Cambodia, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Myanmar, Thailand and Viet Nam)
Migrants and mobile popul...ations face many obstacles in accessing equitable essential health care services due to factors such as living and working conditions, education level, gender, irregular migration status, language and cultural barriers, anti-migrant sentiments, and lack of migrant-inclusive health policies among others. Despite significant progress having been made in the context of malaria control in the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS), human movements can impact malaria transmission patterns and potentially introduce drug-resistant parasites. This legal framework review therefore serves as a guidance document on approaches to address malaria and malaria elimination for migrant and mobile populations (MMPs) in five countries of the GMS.
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Climate change is a growing concern for Bangladesh because 90 percent of the country is approximately 10 feet above sea level. An evaluation was completed which discovered that high tides in Bangladesh were increasing 10 times more rapidly than the global average. This predicted rapid increase in se...a levels places Bangladesh four times higher than the global average. By 2050, approximately 20 percent of the inhabited land in Bangladesh will be inundated by the sea resulting in displacement for nearly 20 million people. The Government of Bangladesh has implemented policies and plans to focus on climate change concerns, but there is still much work to be completed.
Bangladesh is a nation which will continue to experience the devastating effects of climate change. These concerns for the nation are recognized and the Government of Bangladesh is working progressively to implement mitigation and preparedness measures along with making national economic and transportation improvements to better sever and protect the people of Bangladesh.
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This brief summarises key considerations about the social, political and economic context of Goma in relation to the outbreak of Ebola in the DRC as of March 2019. Goma is the administrative capital of North Kivu province and a major urban centre in the Great Lakes Region. The city is home to an est...imated 1.5 million people and serves as an important economic and transportation hub that links eastern Congo to the broader East African sub-region. The arrival of Ebola in Goma would substantially increase the at-risk population and heighten the potential for cross-border transmission to neighbouring countries, particularly Rwanda. This brief therefore focuses on local social and political structures that can be leveraged to promote preparedness and readiness actions.
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Ethiopia saw a six-fold increase in confirmed COVID-19 cases between June and August, with 5,689 cases by end June compared to 34,058 cases as of 19 August. Ethiopia also registered more than 13,000 recoveries and more than 600 deaths. As of the last week of August, Ethiopia was leading eastern Afri...can countries with the highest number of cases.
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