The "Regional Action Plan 2017–2030: Towards a Malaria-Free South-East Asia Region" by the World Health Organization (WHO) outlines a strategic framework to eliminate malaria in the 11 countries of the WHO South-East Asia Region by 2030. It focuses on reducing transmission, particularly of Plasmod...ium falciparum and P. vivax, addressing multidrug resistance, improving surveillance, and ensuring universal access to diagnosis, treatment, and prevention. The plan sets clear objectives and milestones and emphasizes strong governance, cross-border collaboration, community involvement, and sustainable financing to achieve and maintain a malaria-free status across the region.
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Reflecting its commitment to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Namibia volunteered to undertake a second national review of the SDGs in 2021. The focus is on three SDG dimensions, namely, Economic, Social, and Environmental. These three dimensions are comprehensively integrated in ...the fifth National Development Plan (NDP5) pillars: Economic Progression, Social Transformation, Environmental Sustainability, and Good Governance.
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Achieving financial risk protection for the whole population requires significant financing for health. Health systems in low- and middle-income countries (LMIC) are plagued with persistent underfunding, and recent reductions in official development assistance have been registered. To create fiscal
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space for health, the pursuit of efficiency gains and exploring innovative health financing for health seem attractive. This paper sought to synthesize available evidence on the nature of innovative health financing instruments, mechanisms and policies implemented in Africa. We further reviewed the factors that hinder or facilitate implementation, the lessons learnt on the structure, the development process and the implementation.
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This comprehensive HPFM report thoroughly explores Kenya’s health financing landscape. It provides an in-depth analysis of the current state of affairs and sheds light on required strategic changes in health financing. The report points out the need to improve public financial management within th...e health sector, for more efficient financial systems. It focuses on better resourceraising and utilization mechanisms. The matrix highlights the need for consolidation of fragmented health financing arrangements, for a more efficient health system. It also emphasizes the need for enhancing strategic purchasing of health services, to improve the overall efficiency and quality of care. Additionally, the report stresses the critical
role of leveraging data and information systems for more evidence-based informed decision-making. These recommendations are crucial for advancing Kenya’s health financing system and moving closer to the UHC goal.
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The guidelines are primarily intended for health-care professionals working in first- or second-level health-care facilities, including emergency, inpatient and outpatient services. They are also directed at policy-makers, health-care planners and programme managers, academic institutions, non-gover...nmental and civil society organizations to inform capacity-building, teaching and research agendas.
Web annex A provides the quantitative evidence reports, Web annex B summarizes the qualitative and economic evidence and Web annex C presents the Evidence-to-Decision frameworks.
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Only 10 per cent of households have electricity. Less than one half (46 per cent) of the households use basic sanitation facilities. Three in every four of the household population had basic drinking water services. More than one third of under-5 Malawian children (boys 39 per cent than girls 32 per... cent) suffer from stunting with related health issues that can include cognitive impairment.
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BMJ Open Quality 2017;6:e000145. doi:10.1136/
bmjoq-2017-000145Although there are many evidence-based practices that reduce the risk of maternal and neonatal mortality around the time of birth, there remains a gap between what is known and the care received. This knowdo gap is a source of preventab...le maternal and perinatal deaths and is the focus of improvement efforts in many countries. Following an increase in perinatal and maternal deaths, Gobabis District Hospital initiated a quality improvement (QI) initiative to increase adherence to these WHO Safe Childbirth Checklist (SCC)-targeted essential birth practices.
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This Implementation Kit (I-Kit), developed by the Health Communication Capacity Collaborative (HC3), which is funded by USAID and based at the Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs, offers structured guidance for improving social and behavioural change communication (SBCC) strategies relat...ed to malaria in pregnancy (MiP). Designed for programme managers and stakeholders, the toolkit addresses critical communication gaps in MiP programming, particularly among service providers. It provides tools to help users integrate MiP into situation analyses, segment audiences, define behavioural objectives and draft strategic communication plans.
MiP poses a significant public health challenge, contributing to maternal and neonatal mortality and morbidity in sub-Saharan Africa. Although effective interventions exist, such as the use of insecticide-treated nets, intermittent preventive treatment in pregnancy (IPTp) and timely diagnosis and treatment, their implementation remains inconsistent. The I-Kit supports more effective SBCC planning and implementation, with the aim of increasing the uptake and impact of these interventions and ultimately reducing malaria-related deaths and illness among pregnant women and newborns.
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Report of a virtual meeting 21–23 June 2022
This toolkit suggests several approaches to addressing technology
access disparities. At its core is a comprehensive checklist that helps
teams systematically evaluate their current practices and identify
opportunities for improvement. This structured self-assessment
tool spans both team-level a...ctions and organisational responsibilities,
recognising that change must occur at multiple levels
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This guide aims to provide an overview of successful practice from the field for the disaster risk reduction/management practitioner interested in EWS. It presents guiding principles that will build a strong foundation for the design or strengthening of EWS at any level. It is not an operational, bu...t a strategic, guide that insists on asking the right questions and exploring all perspectives prior even to deciding whether or not early warning is the appropriate tool for a given context.
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The Training Toolkit for Community Early Warning Systems is an operational manual that aims to strengthen early warning systems in a developing country context. It accompanies and should put into practice the guiding strategic principles found in the Community Early Warning Systems: Guiding Principl...es.
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Early Adolescent Skills for Emotions (EASE) is an evidence-based group psychological intervention to help 10–15-year-olds affected by internalizing problems (e.g. stress and symptoms of anxiety, depression) in communities exposed to adversity. Published by the World Health Organization (WHO) and U...nited Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), EASE aims to support adolescents and their caregivers with skills to reduce distress. The EASE training manual accompanies the EASE intervention manual and is designed to be used to train EASE helpers (those who deliver the EASE intervention to adolescents and caregivers) and EASE trainers/supervisors (those who will go on to train/supervise future EASE helpers).
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To guide the provision of quality palliative care services across the African region, the African Palliative Care Association (APCA) has developed a framework of core palliative care competencies that can be used by service providers, educators and other stakeholders to guide programmes development.
This report synthesizes the state of knowledge on the interlinkages between environmental degradation climate change conflict and mobility in the East and Horn of Africa, focusing on Burundi, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Tanzania, and Uganda.
Drawing on the World Health Organization’s package of NCD best buys, the report demonstrates how these evidence-based measures can help countries reduce premature deaths, strengthen health systems, and advance progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals. It provides policymakers, donors, ad...vocates, and partners with a clear economic and social rationale for scaling up implementation of proven solutions. By framing NCD prevention and control as both a health and development priority, the report offers a roadmap for action that delivers benefits across populations, economies, and generations. The evidence is clear: investing in WHO’s best buys is not only possible—it is imperative. The time to act is now.
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The health impacts of climate change are no longer a distant threat. They are being felt here and now and becoming more extreme.
To address these threats, the WHO Asia-Pacific Centre for Environment and Health in the Western Pacific Region (ACE) was established in 2019 through a partnership with ...the Seoul Metropolitan Government, the Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment of the Republic of Korea and the World Health Organization (WHO).
The Centre’s mission is to strengthen cooperation and drive action where environment and health meet. This focus on environmental health has created a strong foundation for system-wide change.
This strategic plan builds directly on that work. Over the next five years, the Centre will expand its reach, supporting countries to take practical, systems-based action that ensures healthier people, healthier environments and a healthier planet.
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he UNFPA “Programmatic guidelines: Cash and Voucher Assistance in Sexual and Reproductive Health programming in Emergencies” explains how CVA can be effectively integrated into humanitarian responses to help women, girls, and other vulnerable groups access lifesaving and comprehensive SRH servic...es. Rooted in UNFPA’s mandate, this document provides practical direction for designing, implementing, and monitoring CVA within SRH programming.
The guidance highlights the barriers that hinder access to SRH care, such as affordability, availability, acceptability, and appropriateness, and illustrates how CVA can address financial obstacles by covering transport, user fees, or other indirect costs, while reinforcing health system strengthening efforts. CVA is presented as a complementary tool that supports both emergency and long-term SRH goals. Within humanitarian emergencies, it can contribute directly to achieving MISP objectives, including:
Enabling survivors of sexual violence to access clinical and psychosocial care;
Supporting the continuation of HIV and STI treatment, including coverage of transport;
Facilitating safe deliveries and emergency obstetric and newborn care; and
Removing financial barriers to voluntary family planning and contraceptive access, while ensuring informed choice and avoiding coercion.
Beyond the MISP, CVA also supports the transition to comprehensive SRH services in protracted emergencies and recovery phases. Examples include using cash or vouchers to encourage antenatal and postnatal care, ensure menstrual hygiene, sustain cancer prevention and treatment, fund obstetric fistula repair, and promote SRH education among adolescents.
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PHSM are vital in reducing the risk and scale of infectious disease transmission and lowering hospitalization and deaths. Examples include contact tracing, quarantine and isolation, mask use, ventilation, school or workplace measures, mobility restrictions and travel requirements.
While these mea...sures are essential, decision-making on PHSM becomes particularly complex during rapidly evolving health emergencies, with incomplete information and under significant public and political pressure, especially when the pathogen is novel or poorly understood. In such contexts, guidance needs to be agile and responsive, developed and adapted based on emerging evidence and shifting epidemiological patterns. Decision-makers are frequently confronted with difficult trade-offs, having to balance measures that are:
─ effective but socially disruptive;
─ cost-effective but logistically burdensome;
─ beneficial for public health but economically disruptive; or
─ practical but inequitable or unethical
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