Briefing Note no. 80 November 2015
The Global Task Force on Cholera Control (GTFCC) launched Ending Cholera: A Global
Roadmap to 2030 (Global Roadmap) (1), a strategy that aims to reduce global cholera
deaths by 90% and eliminate the disease in at least 20 countries by 2030. It is
organized according to three main axes:
• E...nsuring early detection and response to contain outbreaks; (2)
• Adopting a multisectoral approach to prevent and control cholera in hotspots; and
• Establishing an effective coordination mechanism for technical support, resource
mobilization and partnership at local and global levels.
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The 2030 health-related Sustainable Development Goals call on countries to end AIDS as a public health threat and also to achieve universal health coverage. The World Health Organization (WHO) promotes primary health care (PHC) as the key mechanism for achieving universal health coverage, and the PH...C approach is also essential for ending AIDS and reaching other Sustainable Development Goal targets.
The PHC approach is defined as a whole-of-society approach to health that aims to maximize the level and distribution of health and well-being through three components: (1) primary care and essential public health functions as the core of integrated health services; (2) multisectoral policy and action; and (3) empowered people and communities.
This publication helps decision-makers to consider and optimize the synergies between existing and future assets and investments intended for both PHC and disease-specific responses, including HIV. Specifically, it aims to:
• provide guidance to policy-makers, health system managers and programmatic leads from both PHC and HIV backgrounds regarding opportunities to jointly advance their respective efforts to strengthen PHC and end AIDS as a public health threat; and
• provide a resource for all stakeholders who seek to contribute to strengthening PHC and ending AIDS as a public health threat in a synergistic manner, including people living with HIV, members of key and vulnerable populations, community and civil society representatives, people working in all areas of health systems, researchers, funders and private-sector decision-makers.
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This report started with a simple question—“How can we tell how much funding is devoted to global health programs?”—and ended (more than two years later) with an answer that is far from simple. As those who have tried know well, tracking health-related funding is challenging in any setting, ...given the range of public and private sources and the many types of services and programs that fall within the definition of “health sector.” It is made all the more complicated when significant external support from donors and private charities plus in-kind donations of drugs and other inputs are taken into account. The task is made yet harder by inadequate public expenditure management systems in countries where public agencies’ capacity is stretched very thin and by donor accounting structures that are not designed to respond in a timely way
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Development finance institutions owned by European governments and the World Bank Group are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on expensive for-profit hospitals in the Global South that block patients from getting care, or bankrupt them, with some even imprisoning patients who cannot afford th...eir bills. At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, some of these same hospitals denied entry to patients suffering from the virus or sold intensive care beds at eyewatering prices to the highest bidder. These development institutions have woefully inadequate safeguards, invest via a complex web of tax-avoiding financial intermediaries, and offer little to zero evidence on the impacts their investments are having. Oxfam is calling on rich-country governments and the World Bank Group to immediately halt their spending on for-profit private healthcare, and for an urgent independent investigation to be conducted into all active and historic investments.
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This publication provides an overview of UN Women’s commitments to the humanitarian community guided by the “UN Women strategic plan 2022–2025”. It highlights areas where UN Women has a unique advantage in advancing gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls across the humanitari...an–development–peace nexus, and in contributing to the Inter-Agency Standing Committee priorities, including localization and accountability to affected people.
The strategy adopts a two-pronged approach:
strengthening accountability towards gender commitments in coordination and implementation of UN-led humanitarian and refugee responses, and
strengthening comprehensive protection and livelihoods support to crisis-affected women and girls.
While taking these approaches, UN Women prioritizes amplifying women’s voices, leadership, and agency as a critical and enabling cross-cutting area.
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This Tailoring Antimicrobial Resistance Programmes (TAP) process assists Member States in initiating and undertaking projects to address the spread of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in their countries. AMR is a complex problem requiring unique, context-specific solutions. This TAP Toolbo...x contains a series of exercises and is aligned with the stages outlined in the TAP Quick Guide. The Toolbox is designed to be used by a TAP working group as they work through the stages outlined in the TAP Quick Guide. The exercises and tools presented in this Toolbox have been abridged and adapted from the TAP Manual which will be available soon.
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Interim Guidance
This document is to help Member States build on actions taken during the COVID-19 pandemic to improve national medium- to long-term preparedness for future threats. It maps COVID-19 preparedness and response actions to the building of sustainable International Health Regulations (2...005) core capacities; locates relevant supporting WHO resources that are not specific to the pandemic; and advocates for the conscious and effective allocation of COVID-19 funds to also meet countries’ longer-term need
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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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Effective implementation of WHO PEN, combined with other very cost effective population-wide interventions, will help even resource constrained settings to attain the global voluntary targets related to reduction of premature mortality and preventionof heart attacks and strokes.
The document introduces a simple classification, minimums standards and a registration form for Foreign Medical Teams (FMTs) that may provide surgical and trauma care arriving within the aftermath of a sudden onset disaster. These can serve as tools to improve the coordination of the foreign medical... team response, and be the reference for registration on arrival as well as a possible global registration mechanism similar to what exists for urban search and rescue teams
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There is an urgent need for safer, simpler, more efficacious and accessible treatment regimens for all forms of TB. The development of Target Product Profiles for TB treatment regimens (referred to as Target Regimen Profiles or TRPs) seeks to guide the drug development process towards important regi...men characteristics corresponding to the needs of end-users.
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