Biology, Diagnosis and Treatment, Epidemiology and Prevention
Vanquishing violence and vulnerability in humanitarian settings
Background paper for the joint African Union–UNAIDS (in capacity of serving
Chair of H6) high-level side event at the 73rd United Nations General Assembly,
24 September 2018, at UNHQ, Conference Room 3
A new report by the world’s largest humanitarian network warns that the number of people needing humanitarian assistance every year as a result of climate-related disasters could double by 2050. It estimates that the number of people in need of humanitarian assistance as a result of storms, droug...hts and floods could climb beyond 200 million annually – compared to an estimated 108 million today.
It further suggests that this rising human toll would come with a huge financial price tag, with climate-related humanitarian costs ballooning
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This report presents the most current data on four specific forms of violence – violent discipline and exposure to domestic abuse during early childhood; violence at school; violent deaths among adolescents; and sexual violence in childhood and adolescence. The statistics reveal that children expe...rience violence across all stages of childhood, in diverse settings, and often at the hands of the trusted individuals with whom they interact daily. The report concludes with specific national actions and strategies that UNICEF has embraced to prevent and respond to violence against children.
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This report reviews the current situation in relation to national capacity to address NCDs and the progress made at country level over the past decade. It highlights that, while progress is being made, there is still much work to be done to create the infrastructure, policies, surveillance and healt...h systems response that will allow NCDs and their contributing risk factors to be successfully contained and reversed.
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Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2018 Jun; 15(6): 1279.
Published online 2018 Jun 16. doi: 10.3390/ijerph15061279
Project protocol
Introduction Ready-to-eat food sold in the street represents a global phenomenon, more common in urbanized areas, that constitutes an important dietary source in populations from low- and middle-income countries. However, research on the kind of street food offered and its composit...ion is scarce. The main objective of this study is to characterize the urban street food environment, including vending places, the food offered, its nutritional composition, food purchasing patterns and advertising.
Methods and analysis This protocol provides a framework for a stepwise, standardized characterization of the street food environment; it consists of three steps that are of increasing complexity and demand increasingly great human and technical resources. Step 1 comprises identification of street food vending sites and characterization of the products available; this stage may be complemented with an evaluation of food advertising in the streets. Step 2 comprises description of street food purchasing patterns, by direct observation. Step 3 requires collection of food samples for bromatological analysis. Different levels of data collection may be defined for each step; hereafter, these are presented as core and expanded evaluations. For the most part, data analysis involves descriptive statistics and basic spatial analysis.
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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.
mnesty International’s annual report on the state of the world’s human rights in 2021, published in March 2022, shows that promises to “build back better” after the Covid-19 pandemic were little more than lip service. Hopes of global cooperation withered in the face of vaccine hoarding and c...orporate greed.
Governments suppressed independent and critical voices, with some even using the pandemic as a pretext to shrink further the civic space. New and unresolved conflicts erupted or persisted. Those forced to flee were subjected to a litany of abuses, including pushbacks by countries in the Global North. But hopes for a better post-pandemic world were kept alive by courageous individuals, social movements and civil society organizations.
The report is available in different languages
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Mortality statistics are fundamental to public health decision making. Mortality varies by time and location, and its measurement is affected by well known biases that have been exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper aims to estimate excess mortality from ...the COVID-19 pandemic in 191 countries and territories, and 252 subnational units for selected countries, from Jan 1, 2020, to Dec 31, 2021.
The Lancet. 10 March 2022. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(21)02796-3.
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The main message emerging from this new comprehensive global assessment is that premature death and disease can be prevented through healthier environments – and to a significant degree. Analysing the latest data on the environment-disease nexus and the devastating impact of environmental hazards ...and risks on global health, backed up by expert opinion, this report covers more than 100 diseases and injuries.
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Lancet 2022; 399: 1155–200 Published Online March 15, 2022 https://doi.org/10.1016/
S0140-6736(21)02488-0
The COVID-19 pandemic has raised profound ethical challenges on an unprecedented global scale. These challenges include how to allocate scarce resources (especially vaccines and therapeutics), both within and between countries, whether and when to mandate vaccines and/or masks, whether and how to co...nduct public health surveillance, whether to issue vaccine passports, and how to address stark international and intranational inequities. In addition, there have been ethical concerns about the conduct of COVID-19 research, such as the appropriateness of challenge studies.
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Schistosomiasis is widely recognized as a disease that is socially determined. An understanding of the social and behavioural factors linked to disease transmission and control should play a vital role in designing policies and strategies for schistosomiasis prevention and control. To this must be a...dded the awareness that schistosomiasis is also a disease of poverty. It still survives in poverty-stricken, remote areas where there is little or no safe water or sanitation, and health care is scarce or non-existent. For a variety of complex reasons, many of which are addressed in this book, the disease is particularly prevalent in sub-Saharan Africa, and persists in certain areas of rural China. This concern for human behaviour in an environment of poverty echoes the concerns of the new research priority for “diseases of poverty” identified by the Special Programme for Research & Training in Tropical Diseases.
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Schistosomiasis is widely recognized as a disease that is socially determined. An
understanding of the social and behavioural factors linked to disease transmission and
control should play a vital role in designing policies and strategies for schistosomiasis
prevention and control. To this must b...e added the awareness that schistosomiasis is
also a disease of poverty. It still survives in poverty-stricken, remote areas where there
is little or no safe water or sanitation, and health care is scarce or non-existent. For
a variety of complex reasons, many of which are addressed in this book, the disease
is particularly prevalent in sub-Saharan Africa, and persists in certain areas of rural
China. This concern for human behaviour in an environment of poverty echoes the
concerns of the new research priority for “diseases of poverty” identified by the
Special Programme for Research & Training in Tropical Diseases.
more