DHS Analytical Studies No. 41
Recommended actions and international and national level
Recommended actions at international and national levels
Special Report
This report of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) was coordinated by Teymur Noori, with technical support from Andrew J. Amato-Gauci, Anastasia Pharris, Jan C. Semenza, Denis Coulombier and Piotr Kramarz.
BMJ,Dodd PJ, et al. Thorax 2017;72:559–575. doi:10.1136/thoraxjnl-2016-209421
The objective of this document is to guide the preparation and implementation of national preparedness plans for the safety of substances of human origin during outbreaks of Zika virus infection, both in affected and non-affected areas.
This analytical report reviews and discusses the potential role and influence of political commitment in implementing endorsements and conducting policy in the field of tuberculosis (TB) prevention and care. It promotes discussion by comparing and analysing the extent to which selected international... commitments, set out in declarations and other committal documents between 2000 and 2018, may have translated into sustainable action. This reflection is relevant and timely, as the United Nations high-level meeting (UNHLM) on TB recently took place, offering countries the opportunity to take stock of progress made, refocus efforts, and step up global commitments to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal of eliminating TB by 2030
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braz j infect dis 2 0 1 7;2 1(2):162–170
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bjid.2016.11.006
1413-8670/© 2016 Sociedade Brasileira de Infectologia. Published by Elsevier Editora Ltda. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
The standards of care cover the routine care and management of complications occurring for women and their babies during labour, childbirth and the early postnatal period, including those of small babies during the first week of life. They define priorities for improving the quality of maternal and ...newborn care for use by planners, managers and health care providers
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At the threshold of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) era, this document captures the remarkable achievements by Member States towards achieving MDGs 4 and 5. It acknowledges new opportunities in the post-2015 phase shaped by the SDGs and the Global Strategy for women’s, children’s and adoles...cents’ health and presents an advanced state of preparedness in the Region. This also highlights the region’s renewed commitment for a more inclusive and more dynamic flagship action for ending preventable maternal, newborn and child mortality as well as to improve women’s, children’s and adolescents’ health and wellbeing in the South-East Asia Region.
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Choko AT et al. Journal of the International AIDS Society 2017, 20:21610 http://www.jiasociety.org/index.php/jias/article/view/21610 | http://dx.doi.org/10.7448/IAS.20.1.21610
This is a case-ascertained prospective investigation of all identified health care contacts working in a health care facility in which a laboratory confirmed 2019-nCoV infected patient (see 2.2 Study population) receives care. Note that this study can be done in health care facilities at all 3 level...s of a health system – not just in hospitals. It is intended to provide epidemiological and serologic information which will inform the identification of risk factors 2019-nCoV infection among health care workers.
There are three primary objectives of this investigation among health care workers in a health care setting where a 2019-nCoV infected patient is being cared for:
To better understand the extent of human-to-human transmission among health care workers, by estimating the secondary infection rate1 for health care worker contacts at an individual level.
To characterize the range of clinical presentation of infection and the risk factors for infection among health care workers.
To evaluate effectiveness of infection prevention and control measures among health care workers
To evaluate effectiveness of infection prevention and control programmes at health facility and national level
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30 January 2020
This document outlines the standard operating procedures for detection and response to case/s of suspected novel coronavirus disease (2019-nCoV) in South Africa. The content of this document should inform provincial preparedness plans.
This updated step by step guide aims to assist the ministries of health (MoHs) in developing the national action plans for noma prevention and control, with a view to sustainably reducing the incidence of noma as a public health problem through programmes that are fully integrated with national heal...th planning, strengthening of primary health care (PHC) and attainment of universal health coverage (UHC).
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Noma (cancrum oris) is a severe gangrenous disease of the mouth and face. It mostly affects children between the ages of 2 and 6 years living in extreme poverty. In addition to the known factors such as malnutrition, lack of vaccination in children and poor oral hygiene, several social and environme...ntal factors such as maternal malnutrition and close spacing of pregnancies that result in offspring with increasingly weakened immune systems are potentially related to the onset of the disease.
The aim of this guide is to assist the ministries of health (MoHs) to identify a general goal to be attained by the end of five years, with a view to sustainably reducing the incidence of noma as a public health problem through programmes that are fully integrated with national health planning, strengthening of primary health care (PHC) and attainment of UHC.
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INTRODUCTION: Health service use among the public can decline during outbreaks and had been predicted among low and middle-income countries during the COVID-19 pandemic. In March 2020, the government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) started implementing public health measures across Kin...shasa, including strict lock-down measures in the Gombe health zone.
METHODS: Using monthly time series data from the DRC Health Management Information System (January 2018 to December 2020) and interrupted time series with mixed effects segmented Poisson regression models, we evaluated the impact of the pandemic on the use of essential health services (outpatient visits, maternal health, vaccinations, visits for common infectious diseases and non-communicable diseases) during the first wave of the pandemic in Kinshasa. Analyses were stratified by age, sex, health facility and lockdown policy (i.e, Gombe vs other health zones).
RESULTS: Health service use dropped rapidly following the start of the pandemic and ranged from 16% for visits for hypertension to 39% for visits for diabetes. However, reductions were highly concentrated in Gombe (81% decline in outpatient visits) relative to other health zones. When the lock-down was lifted, total visits and visits for infectious diseases and non-communicable diseases increased approximately twofold. Hospitals were more affected than health centres. Overall, the use of maternal health services and vaccinations was not significantly affected.
CONCLUSION: The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in important reductions in health service utilizsation in Kinshasa, particularly Gombe. Lifting of lock-down led to a rebound in the level of health service use but it remained lower than pre-pandemic levels.
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Travailler avec les dirigeants communautaires pour lutter contre la VBG est une très bonne et prometteuse approche, car les dirigeants communautaires sont les gardiens de toutes nos croyances et coutumes. Étant donné que la VBG est enracinée dans les croyances et les coutumes, essayer de s...attaquer à la VBG sans impliquer les dirigeants communautaires peut mener à un grand conflit, et vous n’aurez aucun résultat. Les dirigeants communautaires ont également des rôles à jouer dans la réponse aux survivantes de la VBG. Les survivantes s’adressent aux chefs de villages pour faire part de leurs préoccupations et de leurs expériences, et les dirigeants ont des pratiques pour traiter les préoccupations et une approche de la justice qui se base d’abord sur le maintien de la cohésion sociale, mais la VBG ne peut pas être résolue comme n’importe quel autre conflit. D’après mon expérience des programmes de VBG dans mon propre pays et ailleurs, j’ai appris qu’il est plus difficile d’impliquer les dirigeants communautaires dans certains endroits que dans d’autres. Parfois, les aspects religieux rendent les choses plus difficiles. Mais si vous demandez à n’importe quel dirigeant de décrire ce qu’est un dirigeant, ce qu’un dirigeant fait, il parlera de la protection de la communauté. Et c’est aussi ce que nous voulons — protéger les femmes et les filles dans la communauté.
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As a high-burden neglected tropical disease, soil-transmitted helminth (STH) infections remain a major problem in the world, especially among children under five years of age. Since young children are at high risk of being infected, STH infection can have a long-term negative impact on their life, i...ncluding impaired growth and development. Stunting, a form of malnutrition in young children, has been long assumed as one of the risk factors in acquiring the STH infections. However, the studies on STH infection in children under five with stunting have been lacking, resulting in poor identification of the risk. Accordingly, we collected and reviewed existing related research articles to provide an overview of STH infection in a susceptible population of stunted children under five years of age in terms of prevalence and risk factors. There were 17 studies included in this review related to infection with Ascaris lumbricoides, Trichuris trichiura, hookworm, and Strongyloides stercoralis from various countries. The prevalence of STH infection in stunted children ranged from 12.5% to 56.5%. Increased inflammatory markers and intestinal microbiota dysbiosis might have increased the intensity of STH infection in stunted children that caused impairment in the immune system. While the age from 2 to 5 years along with poor hygiene and sanitation has shown to be the most common risk factors of STH infections in stunted children; currently there are no studies that show direct results of stunting as a risk factor for STH infection. While stunting itself may affect the pathogenesis of STH infection, further research on stunting as a risk factor for STH infection is encouraged.
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