There is growing international consensus that food systems transformation is important to address the challenges of malnutrition in all its forms, the burden of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs), environmental sustainability, increasing inequality and ensuring the welfare of workers and animals. In li...ght of the urgency of these challenges, there are questions about the role of red and processed meat in healthy and sustainable food systems. Globally, production and consumption of all types of meat has increased substantially in the last 50 years, and – although red meat consumption is now plateauing in high-income countries (HICs) – is predicted to increase by a further 50% by 2050. Meat consumption remains highly unequal both between and within countries, and animal-source food intakes, including red meat, are lowest among those at most risk of undernutrition
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Antibiotic resistant bacteria are spreading at an alarming rate and some bacterial infections may once again be untreatable. Antibiotic resistance (ABR), conservatively calculated, causes more than 500 000 deaths every year. This number is projected to rise dramatically if radical actions are not ta...ken. Lack of effective antibiotics, diagnostics and vaccines threatens the health of millions and hampers fulfilment of several of the Sustainable Devel- opment Goals. Access to effective antibiotics should be part of every adult and child’s right to health.
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The UNICEF-GAIN Partnership Project
The report notes that iodine deficiency is a leading cause of preventable brain damage worldwide. Insufficient iodine during pregnancy and infancy results in neurological and psychological deficits, reducing a child’s IQ by 8 to 10 points. This translates ...into major losses in the cognitive capital of entire nations and thus their socio-economic development.
The report outlines urgent steps to reduce the risk of mental impairment to babies’ growing brains:
• Integrate salt iodization into national plans to support children’s nutrition and brain development in early childhood;
• Align salt iodization and salt reduction agendas;
• Establish surveillance systems to identify unreached populations;
• Strengthen regulatory systems to enforce existing legislation on salt iodization;
• Recognize the growing importance of fortified foods as potential sources of iodized salt.
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Building on the successes and learnings of the 2012 Nutrition Policy, the new Nutrition Policy of the World Food Programme (WFP) reaffirms the organization’s commitment to addressing malnutrition as a primary channel to reach Zero Hunger. The new policy aims to contribute to the elimination of all... forms of malnutrition—including overweight/obesity—and confirms addressing nutrition in emergencies as a central priority
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The LDHS provides an opportunity to inform policy and provide data for planning, implementation, and monitoring and evaluation of national health programs. It is designed to provide up-to-date information on health indicators including fertility levels, sexual activity, fertility preferences, awaren...ess and use of family
planning methods, breastfeeding practices, nutritional status of children, early childhood and maternal mortality, maternal and child health, and awareness and behaviors regarding HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections. The study also incorporated measurements of HIV, hepatitis B, and hepatitis Cprevalence along with seroprevalence of Ebola virus disease antibodies, the results of which will be included in future addendums. In addition to presenting national estimates, the report provides estimates of key indicators for both rural and urban areas, the country’s 15 counties, and the capital, Monrovia.
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Unhealthy diets and excess body weight are leading risk factors for death and disability in the WHO European Region. Addressing malnutrition in all its forms is essential to ensure health and well-being for all and, consequently, sustainable development. It requires coherent and innovative actions c...overing the entire food system and across other sectors to ensure access to a diversified, balanced and healthy diet for all.
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The development of water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) in schools guidelines for TimorLeste is a landmark moment in our quest to make every school child-friendly – a place where every child can learn, play and grow with pride and dignity. The overarching goal is to improve health, boost education... achievement and promote gender equity in our schools.
The guidelines set clear levels of acceptable standards for water supply, provision of sanitation facilities and hygiene promotion in schools and provide a common framework and policy direction for all sub-sector actors. Therefore, all implementing agencies, managers, planners, architects, water and sanitation technicians, teaching staff, school directors, school boards, district WASH committees, local authorities and other relevant bodies should consult these guidelines, when making implementation plans.
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This year’s report should dispel any lingering doubts that the world is moving backwards in its efforts to end hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition in all its forms. We are now only eight years away from 2030, but the distance to reach many of the SDG 2 targets is growing wider each year. Ther...e are indeed efforts to make progress towards SDG 2, yet they are proving insufficient in the face of a more challenging and uncertain context. The intensification of the major drivers behind recent food insecurity and malnutrition trends (i.e. conflict, climate extremes and economic shocks) combined with the high cost of nutritious foods and growing inequalities will continue to challenge food security and nutrition. This will be the case until agrifood systems are transformed, become more resilient and are delivering lower cost nutritious foods and affordable healthy diets for all, sustainably and inclusively.
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This brief summarizes current evidence and guidance for maintaining safe and effective care across the spectrum of maternal, newborn and infant care while protecting mother and child and health care providers during COVID-19. Furthermore, implications of the principle of “do no harm” are reviewe...d for maternal, newborn and infant care delivery during COVID-19, so that this information is conveniently and readily available to clinical and health system policy leaders and stakeholders in countries and communities. Additionally, considerations for safe oxygen delivery as well as key Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) measures at home and in healthcare facilities for pregnant women, newborns and children are described in detail in the brief.
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Project Programs:
A. Medical Care Program
B. Community Health Promotion and Prevention Program
C. Maternal and Child Health Program
Target Population:
228,000 people living within the Mon, Kayah, Kayan, Karen,Shan, Kachin, Pa O, Chin and Arakan areas
Projec...t Duration:January to December 2016
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The articles in this compendium elaborate on some of the ideas shared at the symposium. Together, they provide a broad view of the dynamic interactions among physical, sexual and brain development that take place during adolescence. They highlight some of the risks to optimal development – includi...ng toxic stress, which can interfere with the formation of brain connections, and other vulnerabilities unique to the onset of puberty and independence. They also point to the opportunities for developing interventions that can build on earlier investments in child development – consolidating gains and even offsetting the effects of deficits and traumas experienced earlier in childhood.
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Humanitarian emergencies result in a breakdown of critical health-care services and often make vulnerable communities dependent on external agencies for care. In resource-constrained settings, this may occur against a backdrop of extreme poverty, malnutrition, insecurity, low literacy and poor infra...structure. Under these circumstances, providing food, water and shelter and limiting communicable disease outbreaks become primary concerns. Where effective and safe vaccines are available to mitigate the risk of disease outbreaks, their potential deployment is a key consideration in meeting emergency health needs. Ethical considerations are crucial when deciding on vaccine deployment. Allocation of vaccines in short supply, target groups, delivery strategies, surveillance and research during acute humanitarian emergencies all involve ethical considerations that often arise from the tension between individual and common good. The authors lay out the ethical issues that policy-makers need to bear in mind when considering the deployment of mass vaccination during humanitarian emergencies, including beneficence (duty of care and the rule of rescue), non-maleficence, autonomy and consent, and distributive and procedural justice
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Education in emergencies is a young area; the evidence of its impact is often anecdotal, and although its status as a humanitarian concern has gained legitimacy in recent years, it has yet to be accepted across the humanitarian community. Much more needs to be done to enhance our understanding of t...he links between education and child protection in emergency situations.
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The World Health Organization (WHO) has recommended a universal antiretroviral therapy (ART) for all HIVinfected children before the age of two since 2010, but this implies an early identification of these infants. We described the Prevention of Mother-to-Child HIV Transmission (PMTCT) cascade, the ...staffing and the quality of infrastructures in pediatric HIV care facilities, in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso.
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The mental health of women not only adversely affects them, but its impact on their
developing infant is also severe. If the ability of women to take care of their baby is
compromised, the survival and development of the infant is jeopardized. Maternal
depression in resource-constrained settings ...is linked directly to lower infant birth
weight, higher rates of malnutrition and stunting, higher rates of diarrhoeal disease,
infectious illness and hospital admission and reduced completion of recommended
schedules of immunization in children. It also adversely affects physical, cognitive,
social, behavioural and emotional development of children (1).
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Main Points
The delivery of humanitarian assistance is expected to slow down significantly over the next seven to ten days in anticipation of the electoral process and limited availability of transport and security assets.
The percentage of extremely food-insecure people who have recei...ved food assistance increased to 65 per cent, as 520,000 people of the targeted 806,000 have now been reached.
Health partners have expressed concern over growing evidence of a spike in cases of severe acute malnutrition in hard-to-reach areas in the Sud region.
Cholera response partners are optimistic that the vaccination campaign of 8 to 15 November will contribute to reducing transmission in Sud and rand’Anse and the risk of a future outbreak
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To support the achievement of health equity in the Region, the regional inter-agency movement Every Woman Every Child Latin America and the Caribbean (EWEC-LAC) advocates for and supports the use of equity and evidence-based policies, strategies and interventions to accelerate equitable progress in ...the health of women, children and adolescents. Although progress has been made, great inequities persist. Women from the LAC region’s poorest countries are almost four times more likely to die due to complications during childbirth than those living in the wealthiest countries. Through the years, several tools, instruments and methods (TIMs) have been developed by global, regional and country partners that can be used to conduct systematic equity-based analyses and/or re-designs of health systems, programs, strategies and interventions. The main purpose of this document is to present an overview of existing TIMs that can be used by policymakers, program managers, development partners, nongovernmental organizations, academia and civil society partners to strengthen systematic identification, analysis and responding to social inequities in the health of women, children and adolescents in LAC. The TIMs included were identified through a systematic search process
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Pregnancy and childbirth during adolescence profoundly affects the lives of millions of girls worldwide, and is a leading cause of maternal mortality and morbidity, and infant and child mortality. Every year, an estimated 21 million girls aged 15–19 years old in low- and middle-income countries be...come pregnant, and approximately 12 million give birth.
For many adolescent girls, the ability to control their sexual lives remains limited. Long-standing gender inequalities and discrimination, marginalization, harmful social and gender norms, and denial of rights, compounded by poverty and violence, render them vulnerable to early pregnancy, HIV and other health threats. Lack of age-appropriate sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) information and services create additional barriers to care and support; as a result, adolescent girls who become pregnant are much more likely to go on to have rapid repeated births.
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As of June 2019, the number of Venezuelans leaving their country reached 4 million, with Colombia, Peru, Chile, Ecuador and Brazil hosting the vast majority of Venezuelans in Latin America. The end of the first half of the year was marked by the announcement of tighter immigration measures in Peru ...and Chile, which triggered a significant peak in flows from Venezuela entering Colombia, Ecuador and Peru. In response to this, UNICEF Country Offices activated contingency measures and capacities for registration and provision of services were rapidly increased, in coordination with relevant authorities, to face the increased demand.
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A comprehensive briefing by Half of Syria
April 2020
A comprehensive briefing on the critical challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic to Syrians, as reported by Syrian civil society organisations. These challenges have been collated following extensive interviews with the teams of member and partner... organisations working in the field in various sectors: health, child care, education, women’s empowerment, media and culture, research, human rights and accountability, relief and social services, and local governance.
This comprehensive briefing also include concrete recommendations formulated by the Syrian civil society.
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