The 2014–2015 Ebola epidemic in western Africa was the longest and most deadly Ebola epidemic in history, resulting in 28,616 cases and 11,310 deaths in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. The Ebola virus has been known since 1976, when two separate outbreaks were identified in the Democratic Repub...lic of Congo (then Zaire) and South Sudan (then Sudan). However, because all Ebola outbreaks prior to that in West Africa in 2014–2015 were relatively isolated and of short duration, little was known about how to best manage patients to improve survival, and there were no approved therapeutics or vaccines. When the World Heath Organization declared the 2014-2015 epidemic a public health emergency of international concern in August 2014, several teams began conducting formal clinical trials in the Ebola affected countries during the outbreak.
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Policy Brief, Updated in March 2017
Key messages
• Meaningful involvement of sex workers in the HIV response through peer-based education and outreach and consultation in policy making and programme planning is vital to reduce their vulnerability to HIV and other sexually transmitted inf...ections (STIs) and ensure that the challenges they face are addressed adequately.
• Sex workers (female, transgender and male) have the right to protect their health through accessing comprehensive and evidence-informed HIV and sexual and reproductive health (SRH) interventions.
• Innovative HIV prevention strategies and creative use of combination interventions are needed to reach mobile and ”hard to reach” sex workers.
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In this article a cluster randomized cross-sectional survey, conducted in Albay Province in the Philippines in April 2016, was used to assess the prevalence of disability and access to support services. This was done with the purpose of generating representative data for local programme development.... A cross-sectional survey was carried out with the WG/UNICEF methodology to examine the prevalence of disabilities, and the accessibility and coverage of relevant services. The aim is for this information to be used for public policy formulation at all levels, as well as to improve communication and advocacy on disabilities.
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The purpose of the survey is to identify the level of preparedness required by a health-care facility to be able to continue operating during, or following a conflict-related security event.
The survey method provides a measure of the security and preparedness of a given health facility in it...s specific context. Such a measure offers evidence-based guidance to assess whether urgent action needs to be taken and, if so, in what form.
Decision-makers can prioritize the most effective actions to mitigate specific risks and, eventually, will be able to rank the importance of needs faced by multiple facilities.
The survey covers three modules: the hazards affecting the facility, the current management procedures in place and the state of the physical infrastructure. Each of these modules is further divided into categories, and each category contains the questions – or indicators ‒ that cover the actual issues addressed in the survey. A detailed description of each indicator is provided in this manual.
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Pan African Medical Journal 2017;27:215. doi: 10.11604/pamj.2017.27.215.12994
DHS Methodological Report No. 20
This study used Service Provision Assessment (SPA) and Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) data from Haiti, Malawi, and Tanzania to compare traditionally used additive methods with a data reduction method—principal component analysis (PCA).
We scored ...the quality of health facilities with three approaches (simple additive, weighted additive, and PCA) for two constructs: quality of services, with only facilities-level data, and quality of care, which incorporates observation and client data. We ranked facilities as high, medium, or low quality based on their scores. Our results indicated that the rankings change with the scoring methodology. There was more consistency in the rankings of facilities by the simple additive and PCA methods than the weighted additive and PCA-based rankings. This may be due to the low factor loadings and little variance explained by the first component in the PCA. We aggregated facility scores to their respective DHS clusters (Haiti, Malawi) or regions (Tanzania) and geographically linked them to women interviewed in DHS surveys to test associations between the use of family planning services and the quality environment, as measured with each index.
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This report aims to raise awareness about the role that the reform of public health laws can play in advancing the right to health and in creating the conditions for people to live healthy lives. By encouraging a better understanding of how public health law can be used to improve the health of the ...population, the report aims to encourage and assist governments to reform their public health laws in order to advance the right to health.
The report highlights important issues that may arise during the process of public health law reform. It provides guidance about issues and requirements to be addressed during the process of developing public health laws. It also includes case studies and examples of legislation from a variety of countries to illustrate effective law reform practices and some features of effective public health legislation.
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This rapid review report has identified the wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) options used in emergency settings, with decentralised wastewater treatment systems (DEWATS) and mobile wastewater treatment units performing most effectively and with minimal costs. Examples are taken from refugee camps a...nd internally displaced people (IDP) settlements due to the Iraq war, the Israeli-Palestine conflict, and the civil wars in Syria and Sudan. WWTP options used in Finland, Haiti, Iraq, Jordan, Palestine, Sudan and Turkey are discussed. Lessons learned from China and suggestions for the Rohingya crisis are also included.
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The Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA4) fulfills that mandate in two volumes. This report, Volume II, draws on the foundational science described in Volume I, the Climate Science Special Report (CSSR).2 Volume II focuses on the human welfare, societal, and environmental elements of climate cha...nge and variability for 10 regions and 18 national topics, with particular attention paid to observed and projected risks, impacts, consideration of risk reduction, and implications under different mitigation pathways. Where possible, NCA4 Volume II provides examples of actions underway in communities across the United States to reduce the risks associated with climate change, increase resilience, and improve livelihoods.
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Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2018, 15(12), 2626; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15122626
Climate change is increasing risks to human health and to the health systems that seek to protect the safety and well-being of populations. Health authorities require information about current associatio...ns between health outcomes and weather or climate, vulnerable populations, projections of future risks and adaptation opportunities in order to reduce exposures, empower individuals to take needed protective actions and build climate-resilient health systems. An increasing number of health authorities from local to national levels seek this information by conducting climate change and health vulnerability and adaptation assessments. While assessments can provide valuable information to plan for climate change impacts, the results of many studies are not helping to build the global evidence-base of knowledge in this area. They are also often not integrated into adaptation decision making, sometimes because the health sector is not involved in climate change policy making processes at the national level. Significant barriers related to data accessibility, a limited number of climate and health models, uncertainty in climate projections, and a lack of funding and expertise, particularly in developing countries, challenge health authority efforts to conduct rigorous assessments and apply the findings. This paper examines the evolution of climate change and health vulnerability and adaptation assessments, including guidance developed for such projects, the number of assessments that have been conducted globally and implementation of the findings to support health adaptation action. Greater capacity building that facilitates assessments from local to national scales will support collaborative efforts to protect health from current climate hazards and future climate change. Health sector officials will benefit from additional resources and partnership opportunities to ensure that evidence about climate change impacts on health is effectively translated into needed actions to build health resilience.
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