This guide aims to provide an overview of successful practice from the field for the disaster risk reduction/management practitioner interested in EWS. It presents guiding principles that will build a strong foundation for the design or strengthening of EWS at any level. It is not an operational, bu...t a strategic, guide that insists on asking the right questions and exploring all perspectives prior even to deciding whether or not early warning is the appropriate tool for a given context.
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The Training Toolkit for Community Early Warning Systems is an operational manual that aims to strengthen early warning systems in a developing country context. It accompanies and should put into practice the guiding strategic principles found in the Community Early Warning Systems: Guiding Principl...es.
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The World Health Organization recently redefined leprosy elimination as a phased process, with the first milestone being the
interruption of transmission, achieved when no new child cases (defined as younger than 15 years) are reported for five consecutive years.
In Pakistan, the well-functioning ...leprosy programme, with effective case management, context-specific active case-finding strategies and
a robust data management system, has contributed to a decrease in new cases. Between 2001 and 2023, new adult cases dropped by 75%
(from 878 cases to 220 cases annually) and child cases by 83% (from 93 to 16). To support the country’s goal of no new child cases by 2030
and ultimately eliminate the disease, the nongovernmental organizations Marie Adelaide Leprosy Centre and Aid to Leprosy Patients, with
support from the German Leprosy and Tuberculosis Relief Association, have developed a zero leprosy roadmap. As part of this roadmap,
the leprosy elimination strategy emphasizes improving active case-finding and providing post-exposure prophylaxis for contacts of leprosy
cases, who are at the highest risk
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Growing emergencies and displacements across the world demand increasingly complex interventions and responses. The World Health Organization (WHO) has developed Malaria control in emergencies: a field manual to provide technical guidance to help partners respond effectively to malaria in emergency ...situations. This field manual supersedes the 2013 WHO handbook.
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Despite being a preventable and curable infectious disease, tuberculosis (TB) has continued to elude global controll efforts. In 2023, 8.2 milion people with TB were diagnosed and notified to the WHO, the hightest number ever reported since WHO began tracking.
Buruli ulcer (BU) is a skin-related neglected tropical disease (skin NTD) caused by infection with
Mycobacterium ulcerans. BU is the third most common mycobacterial disease after tuberculosis and leprosy
in people who are not immunocompromised. The infection manifests in non-ulcerative forms as no...dules,
plaques and/or oedemas, which ulcerate within 4–6 weeks and display characteristic undermined edges and yellowish-white necrotic slough . Most lesions occur on the lower limbs.
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This document on logistics management information systems (LMIS) was developed to address the increasing need for harmonization and standardization of core indicators for managing medicines and health products for neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) at country level (i.e. for last-mile logistics). It... thereby responds to requests from Members States, pharmaceutical groups, financial donors and implementing partners for guidance from the World Health Organization (WHO) for a transparent, standardized reporting mechanism and key indicators for in-country logistics. More importantly, this document will also guide the last-mile logistics process and is relevant for the health workforce working at different levels of national health information systems. It can be adapted and used for any health products depending on the needs of the country or health programmes.
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Breastfeeding is a cornerstone of healthy infant nutrition, development and survival. It is critical for countries* to improve breastfeeding rates in order to achieve global targets for newborn and child health and survival, as well as economic growth and environmental sustainability
Exposure to air pollution has significant adverse health effects, leading to nearly 1 in every 8 deaths globally. Air pollution affects all age groups, from unborn children to older people, in both high- and low-income nations.
Effective surveillance and monitoring of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) and their risk factors are essential for informing evidence-based public health policies, addressing health inequities, and ensuring progress toward global and regional targets. By tracking trends in NCDs, their modifiable risk... factors such as tobacco use, unhealthy diets, physical inactivity, harmful use of alcohol, and air pollution, along with biological risk factors such as overweight and obesity, high blood pressure (hypertension), and elevated blood glucose (diabetes), policymakers can identify emerging threats, target vulnerable populations, allocating resources efficiently. Reliable data also enable countries to evaluate interventions, adjust policies, and strengthen health systems to reduce the burden of NCDs.
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The MEDBOX Annual Report provides an overview of the most important projects of the past year
The overall objective of this approach is to accelerate efforts toward malaria elimination by increasing
access to early diagnosis and treatment. The specific objectives are to: Minimize the barriers that the population faces in accessing timely, quality diagnosis and treatment. Reduce the time bet...ween diagnosis and the start of treatment. Reduce the parasite reservoir in symptomatic infected persons through early treatment. Maximize the transmission-blocking strategy by taking early action on gametocytes. Decrease the incidence of P. vivax relapses.Ultimately, disrupt malaria transmission and prevent mortalit.
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Early Adolescent Skills for Emotions (EASE) is an evidence-based group psychological intervention to help 10–15-year-olds affected by internalizing problems (e.g. stress and symptoms of anxiety, depression) in communities exposed to adversity. Published by the World Health Organization (WHO) and U...nited Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), EASE aims to support adolescents and their caregivers with skills to reduce distress. The EASE training manual accompanies the EASE intervention manual and is designed to be used to train EASE helpers (those who deliver the EASE intervention to adolescents and caregivers) and EASE trainers/supervisors (those who will go on to train/supervise future EASE helpers).
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The objective of this guideline is to present the complete set of all WHO recommendations and best practice statements relating to abortion. While legal, regulatory, policy and service-delivery contexts may vary from country to country, the recommendations and best practices described in this docume...nt aim to enable evidence-based decision-making with respect to quality abortion care.
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This publication provides an overview of evidence and guidance on the growing challenge of workplace heat stress in the context of climate change. It highlights the health and productivity risks faced by billions of workers, especially in manual labor sectors. The report details the physiological, s...ocioeconomic, and mental health impacts of heat stress and outlines evidence-based strategies for prevention and mitigation. It emphasizes the need for occupational heat action programmes, stakeholder collaboration, and tailored interventions to protect vulnerable workers, reduce productivity losses, and support sustainable development in a warming world.
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This document provides an overview of malaria rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs) for Principal Recipients (PRs) of Global Fund grants, indicating their eligibility for procurement under the Global Fund's Quality Assurance Policy. The included products have been assessed and approved by the WHO Prequalifi...cation of Diagnostics Programme (WHO PQ), the relevant regulatory authorities of the GHTF founding members or the Global Fund Expert Review Panel for Diagnostics (ERPD). Updates are made based on new evidence and regulatory assessments.
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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 annual bulletin of the Mekong Malaria Elimination (MME) programme is a yearly report that reviews ongoing efforts to combat multidrug resistance and eliminate malaria in the 6 countries of the Greater Mekong subregion (GMS): Cambodia, China (Yunnan province), Lao People's Democratic Republic, My...anmar, Thailand and Viet Nam.
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Malaria remains a significant public health concern in the SADC region, accounting for 20% of childhood deaths, as well as prompting numerous outpatient visits and hospitalisations. Around three-quarters of the population, including 35 million children under the age of five and 8.5 million pregnant ...women, are at risk. Transmission patterns vary from high and stable in the north to malaria-free in the south, with low, unstable and seasonal zones in between. Although interventions such as indoor residual spraying (IRS), insecticide-treated nets (ITNs/LLINs), intermittent preventive treatment in pregnancy (IPTp), rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs), and artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs) have reduced the malaria burden, challenges persist in terms of funding, human resources, surveillance, and cross-border coordination. Achieving malaria elimination in the SADC region requires harmonised regional standards, strengthened surveillance, and improved access to quality treatment and policy prioritisation.
Accessed on 27/08/2025.
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This guidance synthesizes current evidence on dengue laboratory testing and diagnostics and provides practical recommendations for laboratories, clinicians, public health officials, and programme managers involved in dengue diagnosis, surveillance, and control, in the context of the global emergency.... It includes a diagnostic algorithm for suspected cases, outlining appropriate testing methods based on days post symptom onset.
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