This selected material from Hesperian's Community Guide to Environmental Health offers 48 pages of information on basic sanitation and hygiene, including instructions on building safe, affordable, environmentally-friendly sanitation systems, as well as learning activities to help communities underst...and and prevent sanitation-related health problems. Also available in Spanish and French.
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This is only the cover of the book. Download the whole Toolkit at: www.cdc.gov/reproductivehealth/Refugee/
Understanding the reproductive health needs of conflict-affected women will enable organizations to implement and enhance programs and services to improve the health of women and their fam...ilies. The Reproductive Health Assessment Toolkit (RHA) for Conflict-Affected Women provides user-friendly tools to quantitatively assess the reproductive health needs of conflict-affected women aged 15–49 years. The RHA Toolkit enables field staff to collect data to inform program planning, monitoring, evaluation, and advocacy. It promotes using the collected data to enhance services and improve the reproductive health of women and their families.
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The key updates include: content update in various sections based on new evidence; design changes for enhanced usability; a streamlined and simplified clinical assessment that includes an algorithm for follow-up; inclusion of two new modules
- Essential Care and Practice that includes general guid...elines and Iminterventions and implementation module to support the proposed interventions by necessary infrastructure and resources; and, revised modules for Psychoses, Child and Adolescent Mental and Behavioural Disorders and Disorders due to Substance Use
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Communities can play a critical role in suicide prevention. Facilitating community engagement in suicide prevention is an important task. The toolkit is a step-by-step guide for communities to engage in suicide prevention activities and have ownership of the process and keep efforts sustained. It is... hoped that the pilot version will be used, after necessary adaptation, in many countries and contexts, so that the final product can be strengthened and become more effective and user-friendly.
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This document provides a guidance on the importance of consulting with children with disabilities. It provides practical suggestions for consulting with children and young people with disabilities in a variety of situations. It aims to equip individuals working on child rights with the knowledge an...d skills necessary to communicate with children with a variety of disabilities.
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The update of the ESTC was conducted as a joint endeavour with ERS, consulting experts from international societies and organisations, national TB programmes, civil society and affected communities. The second edition of the ESTC includes 21 standards in the areas of diagnosis, treatment, HIV and co...-morbidities and public health and prevention. The ESTC is a user-friendly guide for clinicians and public health workers to help them achieve optimal diagnosis, treatment and prevention of TB
Available in 25 languages: https://ecdc.europa.eu/en/all-topics-ztuberculosisprevention-and-control/european-union-standards-tuberculosis-care
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MODULE 5 RESOURCE GUIDE | This guide is part of a series of manuals that focuses on six topics in Early Childhood Development (ECD): different programming approaches, basic concepts, assessments, early childhood environments, children with special needs and child protection, and the health, safety a...nd nutrition of young children. The series was prepared within a three-year CRS-led project called “Strengthening the Capacity of Women Religious in Early Childhood Development,” or “SCORE ECD.” Funded by the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, the project helps Catholic sisters in Kenya, Malawi, and Zambia in their work with children aged 0-5 years and their families. The project is being implemented from January 2014 to December 2016
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This guide provides standards and directions on how to carry out rapid needs assessment for Psychosocial Support (PSS) and Violence Prevention (VP) initiatives including child protection and sexual and gender-based violence. In particular, this rapid assessment tool is designed to help gather data i...n an efficient and effective way to help inform integration of PSS and VP issues, as minimum standards, into the broader disaster management action plans in response to an emergency.
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A publication about girls escaping natural disasters and violent conflict in Eastern Africa
Children are on the move. In East Africa region, it is estimated that over 5 million children have migrated across borders or been forcibly displaced in their own country.
Forcable displacement is p...ushing more and more children out of their homes and communities, escaping the violence of war and conflict, only to fall vulnerable to other forms of violence. Girls are particularly vulnerable and need extra protection.
Every day, girls on the move in East Africa face a variety of rights violations, including:
• Exploitation and violence
• Being separated from their families
• Deprivation of essential services
• Use and recruitment by armed groups
• Sexual abuse
• Child marriage
This report highlights concerns that girls in eastern Africa face and calls on international and national decision makers to prevent and end violence that children face when they are forced to flee their homes.
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This brief document compiles existing material related to mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) for the COVID-19 crisis, as well as other resources that can be applicable to the context. Documents are divided into different sections, based on the ‘’spaces of new vulnerability” inheren...t to some IOM programmes although many of them are applicable to other areas. They cover both mainstreaming of MHPSS and specific actions.
MHPSS managers will also find guidance on how to address the less technical and more managerial and programmatic issues related with the pandemic, including programme redefinition, surge capacity and how to manage demands to provide staff support to colleagues in the same missions
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This brief summarizes current evidence and guidance for maintaining safe and effective care across the spectrum of maternal, newborn and infant care while protecting mother and child and health care providers during COVID-19. Furthermore, implications of the principle of “do no harm” are reviewe...d for maternal, newborn and infant care delivery during COVID-19, so that this information is conveniently and readily available to clinical and health system policy leaders and stakeholders in countries and communities. Additionally, considerations for safe oxygen delivery as well as key Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) measures at home and in healthcare facilities for pregnant women, newborns and children are described in detail in the brief.
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The early prevention project “Strong together!” supports refugee parents and their young children (0–4 years) in Berlin, Germany. It aims to mitigate the transmission of trauma to the generation born in exile. For refugee families who have only recently arrived in Germany, the COVID‐19 pande...mic poses a particularly great challenge. Not only are they confronted with numerous challenges in respect to rebuilding their lives in Germany after fleeing war and persecution, but are also vulnerable to conscious and unconscious anxieties, fantasies, and conflicts evoked by the pandemic and the threat it poses to their lives. This was observed in the context of the mother–child groups of “Strong together!”
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Current evidence that the climate is changing is overwhelming. Impacts of climate change and variability are being observed: more intense heat-waves, fires and floods; and increased prevalence of food- water- and vector-borne diseases. Climate change will put pressure on environmental and health det...erminants, such as food safety, air pollution and water quantity and quality. A climate-resilient future depends fundamentally on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Limiting warming to below 2 °C requires transformational technological, institutional, political and behavioural changes: the foundations for this are laid out in the Paris Agreement of December 2015. The health sector can lead by example, shifting to environmentally friendly practices and minimizing its carbon emissions. A climate-resilient future will increasingly depend on managing and reducing climate change risks to protect health. In the near term, this can be enhanced by including climate change in national health programming and creating climate-resilient health systems.
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Energy use in the home is a vital and ubiquitous feature of human society. Energy
is used for a wide variety of purposes, including cooking, space heating, light-
ing, small-scale income generation, various household tasks, and entertainment.
The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the International Organization for Migration (IOM), Georgetown University, and the United Nations University have today launched new guidelines to provide the first-ever global policy framework that will help protect, include, and empower children on the ...move in the context of climate change.
The Guiding Principles for Children on the Move in the Context of Climate Change provides a set of 9 principles that address the unique and layered vulnerabilities of children on the move both internally and across borders as a result of the adverse impacts of climate change. Currently, most child-related migration policies do not consider climate and environmental factors, while most climate change policies overlook the unique needs of children.
The guidelines note that climate change is intersecting with existing environmental, social, political, economic, and demographic conditions contributing to people’s decisions to move. In 2020 alone, nearly 10 million children were displaced in the aftermath of weather-related shocks. With around one billion children – nearly half of the world’s 2.2 billion children – living in 33 countries at high risk of the impacts of climate change, millions more children could be on the move in the coming years.
Developed in collaboration with young climate and migration activists, academics, experts, policymakers, practitioners, and UN agencies, the guiding principles are based on the globally ratified Convention on the Rights of the Child and are further informed by existing operational guidelines and frameworks.
Recommendations for safeguarding the rights and well-being of children regardless of their location or migration status.
The guiding principles provide national and local governments, international organizations and civil society groups with a foundation to build policies that protect children’s rights. The organizations and institutions are calling on governments, local and regional actors, international organizations, and civil society groups to embrace the guiding principles to help protect, include, and empower children on the move in the context of climate change.
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Patient safety standards are critical for the establishment and assessment of patient safety programmes within hospitals. This third edition of the Patient safety assessment manual provides an updated set of standards and assessment criteria that reflect current best practice and WHO guidance. The m...anual will support the implementation of patient safety assessments and improvement programmes within hospitals as part of the Patient Safety Friendly Hospital Framework to ensure that patient safety is prioritized and facilities and staff implement best practices. The manual is a key tool for use by professional associations regulatory accrediting or oversight bodies and ministries of health to improve patient safety.
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Pregnancy and childbirth during adolescence profoundly affects the lives of millions of girls worldwide, and is a leading cause of maternal mortality and morbidity, and infant and child mortality. Every year, an estimated 21 million girls aged 15–19 years old in low- and middle-income countries be...come pregnant, and approximately 12 million give birth.
For many adolescent girls, the ability to control their sexual lives remains limited. Long-standing gender inequalities and discrimination, marginalization, harmful social and gender norms, and denial of rights, compounded by poverty and violence, render them vulnerable to early pregnancy, HIV and other health threats. Lack of age-appropriate sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) information and services create additional barriers to care and support; as a result, adolescent girls who become pregnant are much more likely to go on to have rapid repeated births.
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Background
Noncommunicable diseases are major contributors to morbidity and mortality worldwide. Modifying the risk factors for these conditions, such as physical inactivity, is thus essential. Addressing the context or circumstances in which physical activity occurs may promote physical activity a...t a population level. We assessed the effects of infrastructure, policy or regulatory interventions for increasing physical activity.
Methods
We searched PubMed, Embase and clinicaltrials.gov to identify randomised controlled trials (RCTs), controlled before-after (CBAs) studies, and interrupted time series (ITS) studies assessing population-level infrastructure or policy and regulatory interventions to increase physical activity. We were interested in the effects of these interventions on physical activity, body weight and related measures, blood pressure, and CVD and type 2 diabetes morbidity and mortality, and on other secondary outcomes. Screening and data extraction was done in duplicate, with risk of bias was using an adapted Cochrane risk of bias tool. Due to high levels of heterogeneity, we synthesised the evidence based on effect direction.
Results
We included 33 studies, mostly conducted in high-income countries. Of these, 13 assessed infrastructure changes to green or other spaces to promote physical activity and 18 infrastructure changes to promote active transport. The effects of identified interventions on physical activity, body weight and blood pressure varied across studies (very low certainty evidence); thus, we remain very uncertain about the effects of these interventions. Two studies assessed the effects of policy and regulatory interventions; one provided free access to physical activity facilities and showed that it may have beneficial effects on physical activity (low certainty evidence). The other provided free bus travel for youth, with intervention effects varying across studies (very low certainty evidence).
Conclusions
Evidence from 33 studies assessing infrastructure, policy and regulatory interventions for increasing physical activity showed varying results. The certainty of the evidence was mostly very low, due to study designs included and inconsistent findings between studies. Despite this drawback, the evidence indicates that providing access to physical activity facilities may be beneficial; however this finding is based on only one study. Implementation of these interventions requires full consideration of contextual factors, especially in low resource settings.
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Women, girls and marginalized groups who are largely dependent on natural resources for livelihoods are among the hardest hit by extreme weather patterns. These weather patterns limit their access to food, water, shelter, education and access to essential health services, including those that addres...s sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR), gender-based violence (GBV) and preventing harmful practices such as child marriage and female genital mutilation.
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