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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Definition and categorization of the time of vertical transmission of SARS-CoV-2
Scientific report 8 February 2021
Guidance for clinical case management of thrombosis syndrome with thrombocytopenia (TTS) following vaccination to prevent coronavirus disease (COVID-19)
Interim guidance 19 July 2021
Community health worker teams are potential game-changers in ensuring access to care in vulnerable communities. Who are they? What do they actually do? Can they help South Africa realize universal health coverage? As the proactive arm of the health services, community health workers teams provide ho...usehold and community education, early screening, tracing and referrals for a range of health and social services. There is little local or global evidence on the household services provided by such teams, beyond specific disease-oriented activities such as for HIV and TB. This paper seeks to address this gap.
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Avec l’augmentation soudaine du nombre d’hospitalisations causées par la pandémie de COVID-19 en Amérique latine et dans les Caraïbes, et étant donné la rareté des ressources humaines et matérielles telles que les équipements médicaux et les gaz médicaux, il est devenu nécessaire de ...repenser les modèles de soins dans la Région dans le but d’optimiser l’utilisation de ce qui est disponible et de s’assurer qu’un plus grand nombre de patients recevront l’oxygène dont ils ont besoin en quantité et en qualité. L’oxygène est inclus dans la liste des médicaments essentiels de l’Organisation mondiale de la Santé et sert à soigner les patients à tous les niveaux des réseaux de services de santé intégrés. L’efficacité de l’utilisation de l’oxygène est démontrée dans le traitement de patients atteints de maladies respiratoires causées par la COVID-19, et cette efficacité pourra être grandement améliorée si on encourage le recours rationnel, durable et sûr à cette pratique.
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E-book Project Reab Post-Covid
O projeto Reab pós-Covid-19 foi elaborado em parceria entre Ministério da Saúde, Conselho Nacional de Secretários de Saúde (CONASS), Conselho Nacional de Secretarias Municipais de Saúde (Conasems) e o SírioLibanês. Uma das ações desenvolvidas foi a elaboraç...ão do material apresentado a seguir. Por meio dele buscamos facilitar a difusão do conhecimento sobre o tema e o que há de oficial no Brasil sobre o assunto de maneira prática, objetiva e compatível com a realidade do SUS.
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Rethinking Health with Covid-19 Lessons and Challenges
Este e-book que integra estratégias de três Projetos PROADISUS (Lean nas Emergências, Reab pós-COVID-19 e Cuidados Paliativos) e expõe temas relevantes, relacionados à necessidade de retorno seguro de atividades hospitalares, em paralelo ...à crise que a pandemia ainda impõe a todos os serviços de saúde. Abordaremos estratégias para a reativação ou retomada de serviços hospitalares em paralelo à presença do SARS-CoV-2.
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The 2021 WHO health and climate change global survey report provides a valuable snapshot of the overall progress governments have made in addressing the health risks of climate change. The findings on key health and climate change indicators aim to empower policy makers to: make informed decisions o...n the implementation of policies and plans; identify evidence gaps; and better understand the barriers to achieving adaptation and resilience priorities in the health sector while maximizing the health benefits of sector-wide climate mitigation efforts.
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Wet markets have been implicated in multiple zoonotic outbreaks, including COVID-19. They are also a conduit for legal and illegal trade in wildlife, which threatens thousands of species. Yet wet markets supply food to millions of people around the world, and differ drastically in their physical com...position, the goods they sell, and the subsequent risks they pose. As such, policy makers need to know how to target their actions to efficiently safeguard human health and biodiversity without depriving people of ready access to food.
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Clinical guidelines for the comprehensive care of patients with drug-resistant tuberculosis
Ethical perspectives on a future vaccination program against COVID-19 in Germany
Epidemiologisches Bulletin3 | 202121. Januar 2021 (online vorab)
Every year, nearly 250 million people move across borders temporarily or permanently for a job opportunity, studying, to flee a crisis back home, or for other reasons. Another 750 million move for similar reasons within the borders of their countries. With the understanding that human mobility affec...ts public health, and health affects human mobility and migrants, for decades, IOM has been providing critical health services to women, children and men on the move, while standing by governments for technical and operational support as needed. In 2019, in lower-income settings and in complex emergencies, along the world’s most perilous migration routes, in the aftermath of natural disasters or in response to disease outbreaks, IOM’s health teams have provided hundreds of thousands with primary health-care consultations, mental health and psychosocial support, sexual and reproductive health care, pre-migration health services, and much more.
This year, more than ever before, as the world reels from the socioeconomic impact of COVID-19, we have experienced that health is a cross-cutting component of overall human development and well-being.
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The COVID-19 pandemic and in fact all crises – acute or prolonged – remind us that human rights need to be central in all recovery and development efforts. The Sustainable Development Goals will only be achieved if we are able to create equal opportunities for all, address failures exposed and e...xploited by COVID-19, and apply human rights standards to tackle entrenched, systematic, and intergenerational inequalities, exclusion and discrimination.
We also share examples from Dorcas’ practice and formulate recommendations based on good practices of other organisations as well as our own. With this report, we aim to inform and inspire policy makers and humanitarian and development practitioners on inclusion of the rights of Older People in the current COVID-19 crisis, as well as others yet to come.
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Updated 20 Nov. 2020
Countries can use this checklist of hospital governance, structures, plans and protocols to rapidly determine the current capacities of hospitals to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic and to identify gaps and major areas that require investment and action for the development of h...ospital readiness improvement plans. The tool can be used periodically to monitor hospital emergency operational readiness capacity development
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