WHO’s Country Cooperation Strategy (CCS) defines the Organization’s medium-term vision for working in and with a particular country. The CCS, developed in the context of global and national health priorities, examines the overall health situation in a country, including the state of the health s...ector, socioeconomic status and the major health determinants.
This CCS sets out WHO’s strategic framework for collaboration with the Syrian Arab Republic, from June 2022 until June 2025, in light of the 12 years of crisis that have had a devastating impact on the health sector and infrastructure of basic services. It carefully considers the current and projected issues during its transition from continued humanitarian assistance to recovery, resilience and development. The consolidation of health policies and strategies and health system strengthening, based on the strengthening of primary health care (PHC), aims to contribute to the achievement of national and global development and health goals and the targets of the SDGs.
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South Africa reported it fist case of COVID-19 on 5 March 2020. While the first cases were imported, local transmission has led to a rapid increase in the number of cases. As of 21 April 2020, more than 3,400 cases and 58 deaths had been confirmed. On 15 March, President Cyril Ramaphosa declared a n...ational state of disaster, and the government has since taken several measures to curb the spread of the virus, including closing borders, implementing strict social distancing measures and a 35-day nation-wide lockdown. These measures, along with the global economic shock caused by the pandemic, are expected to generate rising needs requiring an immediate and urgent response. Although South Africa is considered an upper-middle-income country, the amount of disparities—social, economic, and gender—make the country particularly vulnerable during this emergency.
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COVID-19 disproportionately affects the poor and vulnerable. Community health workers are poised to play a pivotal role in fighting the pandemic, especially in countries with less resilient health systems. Drawing from practitioner expertise across four WHO regions, this article outlines the targete...d actions needed at different stages of the pandemic to achieve the following goals: (1) PROTECT healthcare workers, (2) INTERRUPT the virus, (3) MAINTAIN existing healthcare services while surging their capacity, and (4) SHIELD the most vulnerable from socioeconomic shocks. While decisive action must be taken now to blunt the impact of the pandemic in countries likely to be hit the hardest, many of the investments in the supply chain, compensation, dedicated supervision, continuous training and performance management necessary for rapid community response in a pandemic are the same as those required to achieve universal healthcare and prevent the next epidemic.
BMJ Global Health2020;5:e002550. doi:10.1136/bmjgh-2020-002550
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The arrival of COVID-19 in Afghanistan has brought heartache to millions of people who are now battling a deadly pandemic while simultaneously fighting for their survival amid poverty, disaster and war. Over my three years as Humanitarian Coordinator, I have marvelled at the resilience of the people... of this country to cope with the hardships of life in the world’s deadliest conflict – but even this remarkable strength is now being tested by the health, social and economic consequences of COVID-19. The virus is spreading across the country with frightening speed. Every province is now impacted, and people are understandably frightened.
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Reports of antimicrobial-resistant (AMR) microorganisms are increasing globally, threatening to render existing treatments ineffective against many infectious diseases. In Africa, AMR has already been documented to be a problem for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and the pathogens that cause mala...ria, tuberculosis (TB), typhoid, cholera, meningitis, gonorrhoea and dysentery. Recognizing the urgent need for action, the 2016 United Nations (UN) General Assembly approved a resolution to ensure sustained and effective global action to address AMR.
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As part of the UN’s data strategy—which seeks to nurture data as a strategic asset for insight, impact and integrity—UNAIDS plays an indispensable role in generating data for effective action against the AIDS pandemic. It leads the
world’s most extensive data collection on HIV epidemiology,... programme coverage, policy and finance, and it publishes the most authoritative and up-to-date information on the HIV pandemic and response. The UNAIDS database of countryreported data is a foundational pillar for global and regional AIDS programmes, research, advocacy and resource mobilization
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The Government of Malawi is committed to improving health and livelihoods in Malawi through community health – the
provision of basic health services in rural and urban communities with the participation of people who live there.
Historically, Community Health has significantly contributed to im...provements in Malawi’s health outcomes in particular
attainment of MDG4. However, the community health system faces resource constraints and inconsistencies around quality
of service – which negatively affect health outcomes.
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The WHO standard: Universal access to rapid tuberculosis diagnostics sets benchmarks to achieve universal access to WHO-recommended rapid diagnostics (WRDs), increase bacteriologically confirmed tuberculosis and drug resistance detection, and reduce the time to diagnosis. WHO-recommended rapid diagn...ostics are highly accurate, cost-effective, reduce the time to treatment initiation, and impact patient-important outcomes.
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A wide range of potential enablers and barriers were identified for influencing progress for the scale-up of severe wasting services within national health systems. Findings were categorised according to the six pillars of WHO’s health system strengthening framework.
This interagency report provides recommendations for assuring quality of medicines during key activities of country-level procurement agencies, namely prequalification of pharmaceutical products and manufacturers; purchase of pharmaceutical products; storage of pharmaceutical products; and distribut...ion of pharmaceutical products.
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Handbook of Foodborne Pathogenic Microorganisms and Natural Toxins
March - December 2018
The Government of Bangladesh has kept its borders open to Rohingya refugees and leads the humanitarian response. The people of Bangladesh continue to show tremendous generosity and hospitality in the face of a massive influx. In keeping with its policies, the Government of Ban...gladesh refers to the Rohingya as “Forcibly Displaced Myanmar Nationals”, in the present context. The UN system refers to this population as refugees, in line with the applicable international framework for protection and solutions, and the resulting accountabilities for the country of origin and asylum as well as the international community as a whole. In support of these efforts, the humanitarian community has rapidly scaled up its operations as well. Over a two-month period, the refugee population in Cox’s Bazar more than quadrupled.
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