The State of the World's Midwifery
“The children are psychologically crushed and tired.
When we do activities like singing with them, they
don’t respond at all. They don’t laugh like they
would normally. They draw images of children
being butchered in the war, or tanks, or the siege
and the lack of food.”
Teacher in the... besieged town of Madaya to Save the Children
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This document highlights the key aspects of safe health-care waste management in order to guide policy-makers, practitioners and facility managers to improve such services in health-care facilities. It is based on the comprehensive WHO handbook Safe management of wastes from health-care activities (...WHO, 2014), and also takes into consideration relevant World Health Assembly resolutions, other UN documents and emerging global and national developments on water, sanitation and hygiene and infection prevention and control.
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Civil Society Organisations’ contribution towards community engagement to access and demand health services and encourage communities to practice appropriate health-seeking behaviour in Mon and Chin States
The following report is a study of 14 villages under the Collective Voices project (Nov...ember 2015-December 2017) in the states of Mon and Chin. The objectives of the study were:
(1) to explore Village Health Committee (VHC) members, Basic Health Staff (BHS), and community members’ perceptions on community engagement in seeking and demanding health care and
(2) to describe health-seeking behaviours relating to Maternal, Newborn, and Child Health and hygiene practices among target beneficiaries.
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The vision of the new Strategic Action Plan for Strengthening HIS in Myanmar 2017- 2021 is “A strong health information system for a strong health system”. The mission statement of HIS in Myanmar also developed during the strategic planning exercise is “Generating and making accessible compreh...ensive, integrated and timely health information for decision making at different levels of health system”. The goal of the HIS in Myanmar formulated during the assessment is “ To provide complete, valid, reliable and timely health information for making right decisions at the right time to ensure an equitable, effective, efficient and responsive health system”.
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Level of stunting among Bangladeshi children <5years declined from 51% in 2004 to 36% and underweight from 41% in 2007 to 33% (BDHS 2014). But the decrease in wasting rate is not as expected, which is only from 17% to 14.3 % over last decade. Approximately 3.1 % (BDHS 2014) of under-5 children suffe...ring from SAM only by weight-for-length or height z-score (WHZ) <-3 criterion and estimated to be a total of ~ 450,000. Because, there are no national information on prevalence of SAM using mid upper arm circumference (MUAC) and presence of bipedal oedema in under-5 children, thus the actual number of children suffering from SAM could be much higher than the current estimate.
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Recently, Sri Lanka has been impacted by multiple natural disasters. Sri Lanka experienced a landslide in October 2014, and flooding in December 2014.8 Sri Lanka withstood the worst drought conditions witnessed in four decades in 2016; the extreme drought conditions extended into 2017 and produced s...ubstantial economic and social effects. The drought was responsible for an increase in national poverty levels, due to reduced cultivation income, especially for rural farmers. ... In May 2017, Sri Lanka experienced continuous rains causing flash floods and extreme devastation. However, despite natural disasters and challenges posed by a complex political environment, Sri Lanka’s financial performance remained largely satisfactory in the first half of 2017.
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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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The uneven distribution of HIV risks and burdens across populations is a well-substantiated fact, though seldom publicly acknowledged. Gay men and other men who have sex with men, people who inject drugs, sex workers, and transgender women are 24, 24, 13.5, and 49 times more likely to acquire HIV, ...respectively, than other reproductive aged adults (15 years old and older). Globally, new infections among these key populations account for 45% of all new HIV infections. This figure is likely to be an underestimate, given the intense stigma associated with disclosing and reporting acquisition risks for HIV among gay men, people who use drugs, sex workers, and transgender people. In addition, HIV epidemics in the majority of low- and middle-income countries (90 of 120) have concentrated epidemics among key populations. In countries with more broadly generalized epidemics, risks are still not evenly distributed and key populations still shoulder disease burden that is markedly disproportionate.
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Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR), also referred to as Laos, or Lao, is exposed to natural disasters such as flooding, typhoons, cyclones, drought, and earthquakes. The country is vulnerable to recurrent, sudden-onset and slow onset natural disasters with flooding, storms and typhoons hav...ing a large effect on the population. The country remains highly vulnerable to agricultural shocks and natural disasters.
Lao has established Community Based Disaster Risk Reduction (CBDRR) practices as a result of the many natural disasters the country faces. CBDRR is implemented at the village level to enhance community preparedness and to decrease village vulnerabilities to disasters.
Lao established the National Disaster Management Committee (NDMC) as its national disaster management platform and the National Disaster Management Office (NDMO) to be responsible for DRM (Disaster Risk Management) and DRR activities in the country.
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The major areas of focus for the plan will be:
- Social mobilization and community empowerment (health promotion & education for disease prevention);
- Promotion of access to safe water, good sanitation and hygiene;
- Surveillance and laboratory confirmation of outbreaks;
- Prom...pt case management and infection control;
- Complementary use of oral cholera vaccine (OCV) for cholera endemic communities; and
- Coordination and stewardship between and for all actors.
- Monitoring, supervision, evaluation and operation research to ensure continued improvement in service delivery.
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This Technical Brief focuses on appraising and prioritising options for climate resilience with a view to informing water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) programme and project design.
This Technical Brief:
- provides a simple scorecard/checklist approach to use as a starting point for appr...aising and prioritising options, and as an awareness-raising activity - covers all aspects of WASH
- has a predominantly rural focus, to align with the rest of the Strategic Framework and Technical Briefs
- focuses on current and near future options over the next 15–20 years, which fits in with WASH programming timescales and development
- includes WASH examples to show how the approach can be applied.
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This guide is intended for people involved in the management and operation of small- to mediumsized organized water supply systems. The content has been developed with particular consideration for operational-level personnel with responsibility for chlorination (for example, water treatment plant op...erators and technicians). The material presented within this guide may also be relevant for engineers and representatives from public health, local government, non-governmental organizations, as well as any other individuals supporting water safety planning activities for the supply of safe drinking-water.
Part 1. Chlorination principles: Describes key chlorination concepts, providing a knowledge foundation for the implementation of effective chlorination practices.
Part 2. Chlorination practices: Describes the practical application of the concepts presented in Part 1, including calculations and procedures for safe and effective chlorination of drinking-water supplies.
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The Republic of the Union of Myanmar is at a historic moment, with a new civilian government assuming power in 2016. The country graduated to lower-middle-income status in 2015, and has made significant progress in reducing poverty, improving food security and addressing malnutrition.
The remai...ning challenges to food and nutrition security and achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 2 targets include continued population displacements resulting from conflict, vulnerability to extreme weather events, poverty, limited social protection coverage, high malnutrition and persistent gender inequalities.
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Fostering resilient development through integrated action plan
The Myanmar Action Plan on Disaster Risk Reduction, 2017 is a comprehensive and unified action plan for disaster risk reduction with prioritized interventions across Myanmar till 2020. With a long term vision and considering deep-root...ed underlying drivers of disaster risk, it has set an overall target for 2030. it aims to provide a base for mobilizing and leveraging, primarily, national and external resources and will provide a basis for result printed outcomes.
The action plan identifies 32 priority actions under four pillars: risk information and awareness; risk governance; risk mitigation; and preparedness and response, rehabilitation and reconstruction. For each priority action, objectives, activities, outputs, duration, lead agencies, and supporting partners have been identified.
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