Systematic screening for TB disease is the systematic identification of people at risk for TB disease, in a predetermined target group, by assessing symptoms and using tests, examinations or other procedures that can be applied rapidly.
Systematic screening can benefit people who are at risk of get...ting TB, as early detection and start of treatment can improve their outcomes and reduce their costs. It can also benefit entire communities at higher risk for TB, by reducing the prevalence of TB disease and preventing future cases.
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Interim Guidance 31 march 2020
WHO has established a shipment mechanism to expedite and cover the costs of the shipment of clinical samples from patients with suspected COVID-19 from the country of collection to one of the WHO reference laboratories providing confirmatory molecular testing for COVI...D-19. This document explains the process and documentation required for shipment of specimens.
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People with diabetes mellitus are at an increased risk for foot ulcerations as a result of poorly controlled blood glucose which may lead to gangrene. These patients are at a high risk for lower limb amputations, higher healthcare costs, and lower quality of life. This course aims to cover the preve...ntion of foot ulcers in persons with diabetes, classification of diabetic foot ulcers, diagnosis and treatment of foot infection in people with diabetes and interventions to enhance healing of foot ulcers.
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The article "Economic Burden of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD): A Systematic Literature Review" examines the financial impact associated with moderate-to-very severe COPD. The review analyzes studies published between 2006 and 2016 that discuss healthcare resource utilization (HRU), di...rect costs, and indirect costs related to COPD, with a focus on Europe and North America. It highlights that direct costs, including hospitalizations and medical treatments, increase with the severity of COPD and the frequency of exacerbations. Multivariate analyses identify key factors driving these costs, such as comorbidities and prior treatment history. The findings underscore the significant economic burden of COPD on healthcare systems and emphasize the need for improved management strategies to reduce costs and optimize patient care.
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Air pollution is the top environmental threat to health in Europe. It leads to hundreds of thousands premature deaths per year and billions of Euros in health costs.
Cardiovascular disease is a major cause of disability and premature death throughout the world, and contributes substantially to the escalating costs of health care. The underlying pathology is atherosclerosis, which develops over many years and is usually advanced by the time symptoms occur, genera...lly in middle age. Acute coronary and cerebrovascular events frequently occur suddenly, and are often fatal before medical care can be given. Modification of risk factors has been shown to reduce mortality and morbidity in people with diagnosed or undiagnosed cardiovascular disease.
This publication provides guidance on reducing disability and premature deaths from coronary heart disease, cerebrovascular disease and peripheral vascular disease in people at high risk, who have not yet experienced a cardiovascular event. People with established cardiovascular disease are at very high risk of recurrent events and are not the subject of these guidelines. They have been addressed in previous WHO guidelines.
Several forms of therapy can prevent coronary, cerebral and peripheral vascular events. Decisions about whether to initiate specific preventive action, and with what degree of intensity, should be guided by estimation of the risk of any such vascular event. The risk prediction charts that accompany these guidelinesb allow treatment to be targeted accord-
ing to simple predictions of absolute cardiovascular risk.
Recommendations are made for management of major cardiovascular risk factors through changes in lifestyle and prophylactic drug therapies. The guidelines provide a framework for the development of national guidance on prevention of cardiovascular disease that takes into account the particular political, economic, social and medical circumstances.
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It is now well known that there is a pandemic of Type 2 Diabetes in the world particularly in developing countries. This fact has several implications for the health care system in the developing countries because this condition is associated with metabolic and vascular complications which in turn i...ncreases the mortality and health care costs and compromises the quality and life expectancy of the society.
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The World Heart Federation (WHF) commenced a Roadmap initiative in 2015 to reduce the global burden of cardiovascular disease and resultant burgeoning of healthcare costs. Roadmaps provide a blueprint for implementation of priority solutions for the principal cardiovascular diseases leading to death... and disability. Atrial fibrillation (AF) is one of these conditions and is an increasing problem due to ageing of the world’s population and an increase in cardiovascular risk factors that predispose to AF. The goal of the AF roadmap was to provide guidance on priority interventions that are feasible in multiple countries, and to identify roadblocks and potential strategies to overcome them.
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Hypertension is the leading preventable risk factor for cardiovascular diseases and disability globally. In low- and middle-income countries hypertension has a major social impact, increasing the disease burden and costs for national health systems. The present call to action aims to stimulate all A...frican countries to adopt several solutions to achieve better hypertension management. The following 3 goals should be achieved in Africa by 2030: (1) 80% of adults with high blood pressure in Africa are diagnosed; (2) 80% of diagnosed hypertensives, that is, 64% of all hypertensives, are treated; and (3) 80% of treated hypertensive patients are controlled. To achieve these aims, we call on individuals and organizations from government, private sector, health care, and civil society in Africa and indeed on all Africans to undertake a few specific high priority actions. The aim is to improve the detection, diagnosis, management, and control of hypertension, now considered to be the leading preventable killer in Africa.
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Existing data on chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) prevalence are irregularly distributed around the world, and in many geographic regions data are scarce or even nonexistent. This fact hinders the implementation of adequate preventive and therapeutic interventions to reduce the high burd...en and costs of COPD. In the current study, we have used the Geographic Information System (GIS) inverse distance weighted (IDW) interpolation technique with the objective of visualising spatial data of COPD prevalence in the world and obtaining a visual impression of the magnitude of this global health problem. GIS has been recognised as an effective tool to display the geographical distribution of data, even when they are few and widely separated, as is the case with the prevalence of COPD.
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Marco Schäferhoff and colleagues critique funding estimates for the maternal and child health Millennium Development Goals, and make recommendations for improving the tracking of financing flows and estimating the costs of scaling up interventions for mothers and children.
Objective: There are an estimated 38 million people with HIV (PWH), with significant economic consequences. We aimed to collate global lifetime costs for managing HIV.
Design: We conducted a systematic review (PROSPERO: CRD42020184490) using five databases from 1999 to 2019.
Methods: Studies were ...included if they reported primary data on lifetime costs for PWH. Two reviewers independently assessed the titles and abstracts, and data were extracted from full texts: lifetime cost, year of currency, country of currency, discount rate, time horizon, perspective, method used to estimate cost and cost items included. Descriptive statistics were used to summarize the discounted lifetime costs [2019 United States dollars (USD)].
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Debt has become a substantial burden for developing countries due to limited access to financing, rising borrowing costs, currency devaluations and sluggish growth. These factors compromise the countries’ ability to react to emergencies, tackle climate change and invest in their people and the fut...ure. The latest report, A World of Debt, discusses the actions needed to unleash the resources needed to build a more prosperous, inclusive, and sustainable world.
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Violence against women and girls is widespread in the Region of the Americas, resulting in enormous consequences for the health and wellbeing of women and girls, their families and communities. These costs are unacceptable and they can be prevented through evidence-based action, including the health... sector through its policies and protocols, as well as in collaboration with other sectors. This report remains the first of its kind and is a major milestone for the Region. It is specifically informed by the commitments of Member States in the regional Strategy and Plan of Action on Strengthening the Health System to Address Violence against Women. The report provides an analysis of efforts to advance the prevention of violence against women through health policies, clinical protocols, multisectoral plans and related approaches across the Americas. Attention to this topic is timely, as the COVID-19 pandemic has created new visibility for this area of work. This report offers critical information on efforts in the Region that can be learned from and used to build upon in the future to prevent and respond to violence against all women and girls everywhere.
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Even before Russia invaded Ukraine, the global economy was suffering from the repercussions of several man-made conflicts, climate shocks, COVID-19 and rising costs — with devastating consequences for poor people in low-income and developing countries. The war in Ukraine — a major “breadbasket...” for the world — is deepening these challenges on an unprecedented scale. In the immediate, swift and bold action is required by both wealthy and low-income nations to avert further humanitarian and economic catastrophe.
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Kiel Policy Brief, Ukraine Special 1, March 2022.Many African countries heavily rely on imports of agricultural commodities and agricultural inputs from Ukraine and Russia, for example wheat, other grains, and fertilizer. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has disrupted global access to grains due to re...duced production, exports, and increased trade costs. This policy brief investigates the possible long-term consequences of the conflict on food security in Africa
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Version 2.3 , 21 April 2022. The CVIC tool supports credible COVID-19 vaccination costing to facilitate a dialogue with stakeholders, while maintaining sensitivity to protect essential health services.
The CVIC tool provides a structured and comprehensive estimation of incremental operational and... selected capital costs of introducing and deploying COVID-19 vaccines, in alignment with the National Deployment and Vaccination Plan (NDVP). This is essential for resource mobilization, budgeting, and delivery strategy refinement and optimization. The tool has been pre-populated with data from global databases and provides a total cost estimate over an immunization programme over the period of 2021-2023, after which COVID-19 vaccination is expected to be integrated into national immunization plans. Countries can customize the priority target populations based on WHO SAGE guidance and select multiple delivery strategies and vaccine products. The tool is available in all six UN working languages (Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish) and Portuguese. An e-learning course on CVIC is available at OpenWHO.
In this updated version 2.3 of the tool, some minor bugs have been fixed and new features have been added
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Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) – the ability of microorganisms to resist antimicrobial treatments, especially antibiotics – has a direct impact on human and animal health and carries a heavy economic burden due to higher costs of treatments and reduced productivity caused by sickness. AMR is res...ponsible for an estimated 33,000 deaths per year in the EU. It is also estimated that AMR costs the EU €1.5 billion per year in healthcare costs and productivity losses.
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Economics plays a vital role in health policy-making and investments to reduce air pollution; in helping to understand the costs of health care; and in determining nations’ wealth and ability to invest in health and well-being..
In 2016, the risk of premature mortality1 from noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) in Ethiopia was 18.3%. The economic costs of NCDs are significant and are due principally to their impact on the non-health sector (reduced workforce and productivity). In this study, it is estimated that NCDs cost Ethiop...ia at least 31.3 billion birr (US$ 1.1 billion) per year, equivalent to 1.8% of the gross domestic product (GDP). Less than 15% of the costs are for health care.
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