This document provides technical guidance for manufacturers seeking World Health Organization (WHO) prequalification of in vitro diagnostic devices (IVDs) for malaria, with a focus on rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs) for symptomatic patients. It summarises the minimum performance requirements, includin...g analytical and clinical performance standards, and emphasises considerations relating to diverse specimen types, testing environments and user populations in low- and middle-income countries. The guidance is aligned with the criteria and prequalification processes of the WHO Global Malaria Programme, while clarifying that demonstration of clinical utility is outside the scope of prequalification.
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The guide helps patients to understand their rights in relation to the care received and provides insights into the common legal and
human rights issues they may encounter, and encourages them to share these with the health care provider for support. This booklet covers key issues that you mig...ht need to understand about ethical care, human rights and legal aspects. It aims to help people with serious illness as they face these issues, and give them guidance on how they can find solutions.
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For education to be competency-based and effective, appropriate training methodologies have to be used to support the learner to have the appropriate knowledge and to translate this knowledge into skills and competencies. Such education and training should lead to a change in attitudes, beliefs a...nd values, thus making the palliative care graduate able to do their job very effectively. To that end, APCA has developed this new resource, which is a guide to effective teaching methodologies in palliative care, targeting educators and trainers across Africa. This guide has been developed to enable educators and trainers to acquire knowledge and skills for using effective, practical, participatory and experiential teaching methods, and to use these in extending learning to all health care providers in Africa. The methods presented in this guide are based on existing practical and documented evidence of effective palliative care education.
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The Guidelines for the Use of the APCA African Palliative Outcome Scale (POS) has been developed by the APCA, in collaboration with
stakeholders, to help appropriately trained health practitioners and researchers across the region to utilise the APCA African POS in their work place (Powell et... al, 2007; Warria et al, 2007). Not only do the guidelines provide a clear rationale for measuring palliative care outcomes, but they also outline practical information on how to use the tool to collect data and analyse its results. So why is there a need for these guidelines?
Palliative care as a concept and discipline is not well understood across Africa, and its development is still embryonic in many countries. While there are many obstacles that hinder palliative care development on the continent, a key challenge is the lack of accurate information about the palliative care being provided and its outcomes. The APCA African POS is a useful tool to help us measure these outcomes and, given that
measuring palliative care outcomes remains a relatively new concept, it is important to guide people on how to use the tool. Of course, these guidelines are not intended to address everything related to the measurement of palliative care outcomes; they contain only essential information for providers. More detailed information on the use of outcome tools, and in particular within the research setting, can be gained from contacting relevantly trained professionals.
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On 13 August 2024, the Africa Centres for Disease Control (Africa CDC) declared the multi-country mpox outbreak a public health emergency of continental security, with strong recommendations to improve surveillance and vaccine deployment in all AU Member States. On 14 August 2024, the WHO Director-G...eneral declared mpox outbreak a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC).
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WHO, as the coordinating authority on international health, supports countries in protecting public health through evidence-based policies and actions. Considering the significant health burden and the multiple potential benefits of interventions, the WHO Air Quality, Energy and Health Unit aims to ...support countries by providing evidence, building institutional capacity and leveraging the “health argument” to convene sectors to tackle air pollution and accelerate energy access.
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Tobacco mythbusters: tools for debunking common myths promoted by the tobacco industry
The health impacts of climate change are no longer a distant threat. They are being felt here and now and becoming more extreme.
To address these threats, the WHO Asia-Pacific Centre for Environment and Health in the Western Pacific Region (ACE) was established in 2019 through a partnership with ...the Seoul Metropolitan Government, the Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment of the Republic of Korea and the World Health Organization (WHO).
The Centre’s mission is to strengthen cooperation and drive action where environment and health meet. This focus on environmental health has created a strong foundation for system-wide change.
This strategic plan builds directly on that work. Over the next five years, the Centre will expand its reach, supporting countries to take practical, systems-based action that ensures healthier people, healthier environments and a healthier planet.
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PHSM are vital in reducing the risk and scale of infectious disease transmission and lowering hospitalization and deaths. Examples include contact tracing, quarantine and isolation, mask use, ventilation, school or workplace measures, mobility restrictions and travel requirements.
While these mea...sures are essential, decision-making on PHSM becomes particularly complex during rapidly evolving health emergencies, with incomplete information and under significant public and political pressure, especially when the pathogen is novel or poorly understood. In such contexts, guidance needs to be agile and responsive, developed and adapted based on emerging evidence and shifting epidemiological patterns. Decision-makers are frequently confronted with difficult trade-offs, having to balance measures that are:
─ effective but socially disruptive;
─ cost-effective but logistically burdensome;
─ beneficial for public health but economically disruptive; or
─ practical but inequitable or unethical
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This Toolkit for ensuring rights-based and ethical use of digital technologies in HIV and health programmes is derived from the comprehensive UNDP Guidance on the rights-based and ethical use of digital technologies in HIV and health programmes document. The foundational UNDP Guidance document outli...nes key ethical, human rights and technical considerations for countries adopting digital technologies for health, detailing human rights risks, norms and standards, and provides a practical checklist for assessment.
The Toolkit serves as a quick reference guide for UNDP staff, governments, partners, technology developers, and civil society organizations, designed to provide practical guidance for implementing ethical digital health solutions by distilling and structuring the in-depth information from the broader UNDP Guidance into six easy-access modules. Each module addresses a specific key issue by outlining definitions, ethical principles, key considerations, and recommendations that align with the comprehensive framework established by the UNDP Guidance.
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These Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) have been developed by the Infant Feeding in Emergencies (IFE) Core Group Infectious Disease Working Group based on the most recent recommendations, collective knowledge and evidence on cholera. The FAQs also draw on infant and young child feeding (IYCF) recom...mendations from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Infant Feeding in Emergencies Core Group (IFE CG). These FAQs are intended to provide answers to health workers and the public – including mothers who are breastfeeding or expressing milk – on breastfeeding during a cholera outbreak.
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Ces questions fréquemment posées (FAQs) ont été élaborées par le Groupe de travail sur les maladies infectieuses du Groupe l'alimentation central sur des nourrissons en situation d'urgence (IFE) en se basant sur les recommandations les plus récentes, les connaissances collectives et les donn...es probantes relatives au choléra. Les questions fréquemment posées (FAQs) s'appuient également sur les recommandations de l'Organisation mondiale de la santé (OMS) et du Groupe central sur l'alimentation des nourrissons en situation d'urgence (IFE CG) en matière d'alimentation des nourrissons et des jeunes enfants (IYCF). Ces FAQs ont pour objectif de fournir des réponses aux professionnels de santé ainsi qu’au grand public- y compris aux mères qui allaitent ou qui tirent leur lait- au sujet de l'allaitement maternel lors d'une épidémie de choléra.
Cesquestions fréquentesreflètent:
•Les preuves disponibles et les derniers outils de lutte contre le choléra du Groupe de travail mondial sur la lutte contre le choléra (2025) et de l'UNICEF (2013)
•Les effets protecteurs du lait maternel et de l'allaitement
•Les effets néfastes liés à l'utilisation inappropriée de substituts de lait maternel
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Current HIV/AIDS Reports (2022) 19:358–374. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11904-022-00615-z.
MINDSPACE is an acronym developed by the UK's behavioural insights team to summarise nine key influences on human behaviour: Messenger, Incentives, Norms, Default, Salience, Priming, Affect, Commitment, and E...go. These effects have been used in various settings to design interventions that encourage positive behaviours. Currently, over 200 institutionalised behavioural insight teams exist internationally, which may draw upon the MINDSPACE framework to inform policy and improve public services.
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Building on the WHO guidelines for disclosure to children up to age 12 in 2011, this implementation guidance provides evidence on existing interventions that support children and adolescents living with HIV in the process of disclosure. It includes interventions that focuses on safe disclosure, as w...ell as supporting children and adolescents with onwards disclosure. Specifically, this brief collates existing interventions via a scoping review; assesses key interventions through a realist evaluation lens, identifying what works, for whom, and in what contexts; and highlights emerging considerations, key gaps, and key actions.
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This brief report summarizes recent information on HIV drug resistance (HIVDR) in the era of integrase-strand transfer inhibitors (INSTI) for HIV prevention and treatment.
Adolescents and young adults aged 10-24 remain underserved in the global response against HIV. Combination prevention, treatment and care programmes use a mix of evidence-based interventions to meet the current HIV prevention needs of adolescents and young adults. However, there needs to be a focus ...on priority interventions that are evidence-based, practical, contextual and sustainable. This document highlights interventions and recommendations that have passed through the evidence-based lens of the WHO.
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This document, with a focus on the built environment and health care facilities, intends to guide the audience in preparing for and responding to SARI pandemics caused by existing and novel pathogens. It provides technical guidance on designing, establishing, and managing health care facilities for ...severe acute respiratory infections (SARI), covering point of entry, treatment centers, entry to health system facilities, quarantine and community facilities, and home care and quarantine.
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With an estimated population of about 5 million and an annual growth rate of 8 per cent, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, is Africa’s fastest growing city.1 Over 70 per cent of the people live in informal, unplanned settlements with inadequate infrastructure. In addition, heavy rainfalls twice a year ...result in signifi cant fl ood risks. The objectives in Dar es Salaam were to 1) obtain high quality and up to date exposure maps of aff ected communities and as a stretch goal 2) to create a hydrological model using elevation data. Both of these would form important elements to managing fl ood risks but neither had been previously available due to a lack of high quality digital imagery
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This resource was written to support persons who seek to initiate a support group for suicide loss survivors. Suicide bereavement support groups offer a wide range of benefits that can help individuals to navigate the difficult time following a loss. First and foremost, a support group provides a ch...ance to break the silence and reduce the stigma surrounding suicide by creating a space where individuals can openly discuss their grief. It also serves as a source of information about suicide and bereavement. It is important to note that support groups are not a replacement for professional help and that support groups may not be for everyone.
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This report was developed by the WHO TB Vaccine Accelerator Finance and Access working group, co-led by WHO, Gavi and the Government of South Africa. It sets out the working group’s shared vision for equitable access to novel TB vaccines and will advance a shared understanding of the current lands...cape and its possible evolution in the future. It identifies six urgently needed solutions to accelerate access and financing and highlights the roles of different stakeholders to support the implementation of these solutions.
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