Extreme heat events (EHEs) are a leading cause of weather-related injury and death in the United States, and under a changing climate, these meteorological episodes are predicted to increase in both frequency and intensity. Prolonged heat exposure from EHEs places an increased strain on the heart an...d may lead to heat-related illness if the cardiovascular system fails to properly thermoregulate internal body temperature. Every individual is susceptible to heat-related illness, however, those with reduced cardiovascular function and pre-existing cardiovascular diseases are at a greater risk for morbidity and mortality during EHEs. This document gives an overview of our current understanding of heat exposure and its impact on cardiovascular health outcomes, an overview of the medications that may exacerbate heat-related cardiovascular illness, and asummary of the interaction between extreme heat and air pollutants, and their collective impact on cardiovascular health. Additionally, this document summarizes epidemiologic evidence and identifies gaps in the extant peer-reviewed literature on the effectiveness of strategies and interventions to protect against heat-related cardiovascular disease and death. This information is intended to aid health departments and other health professionals in understanding and responding to the impacts of heat exposure on cardiovascular health.
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Humanitarian emergencies result in a breakdown of critical health-care services and often make vulnerable communities dependent on external agencies for care. In resource-constrained settings, this may occur against a backdrop of extreme poverty, malnutrition, insecurity, low literacy and poor infra...structure. Under these circumstances, providing food, water and shelter and limiting communicable disease outbreaks become primary concerns. Where effective and safe vaccines are available to mitigate the risk of disease outbreaks, their potential deployment is a key consideration in meeting emergency health needs. Ethical considerations are crucial when deciding on vaccine deployment. Allocation of vaccines in short supply, target groups, delivery strategies, surveillance and research during acute humanitarian emergencies all involve ethical considerations that often arise from the tension between individual and common good. The authors lay out the ethical issues that policy-makers need to bear in mind when considering the deployment of mass vaccination during humanitarian emergencies, including beneficence (duty of care and the rule of rescue), non-maleficence, autonomy and consent, and distributive and procedural justice
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Pneumonia kills more children than any other illness – more than AIDS, malaria and measles combined. Over 2 million children die from pneumonia each year, accounting for almost 1 in 5 under five deaths worldwide. Yet, little attention is paid to this disease. This joint UNICEF/WHO report examines ...the epidemiological evidence on the burden and distribution of pneumonia and assesses current levels of treatment and prevention. It is a call to action to reduce pneumonia mortality, a key step towards the achievement of the millennium development goal on child mortality.
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Brief review of selected topics
The following pages provide a focus on selected areas in relation to neurology. The specialists who contributed the reviews are listed in the Project Team and Partners
Neurology Atlas (2004)
The Planetary Health Education Framework is a project of the Planetary Health Alliance (planetaryhealthalliance.org). The Planetary Health Alliance is a consortium of over 250 partners from around the world committed to understanding and addressing the human health impacts of global environmental ch...ange
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The purpose of this document is to provide a comprehensive overview of existing institutional arrangement for disaster management in Myanmar at all levels with an aim to make information available to all stakeholders involved in disaster risk management in Myanmar.
WHO's Health in the Green Economy sector briefings examine the health impacts of climate change mitigation strategies considered by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in their Fourth Assessment Report.
Improving the management of childhood tuberculosis within national tuberculosis programmes: research priorities based on a literature review
WHO/HTM/TB/2007.381, 07.02
There is increasing interest in understanding the role of air pollution as one of the greatest threats to human health worldwide. Nine of 10 individuals breathe air with polluted compounds that have a great impact on lung tissue. The nature of the relationship is complex, and new or updated data are... constantly being reported in the literature. The goal of our review was to summarize the most important air pollutants and their impact on the main respiratory diseases (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma, lung cancer, idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, respiratory infections, bronchiectasis, tuberculosis) to reduce both short- and the long-term exposure consequences. We considered the most important air pollutants, including sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide, volatile organic compounds, ozone, particulate matter and biomass smoke, and observed their impact on pulmonary pathologies. We focused on respiratory pathologies, because air pollution potentiates the increase in respiratory diseases, and the evidence that air pollutants have a detrimental effect is growing. It is imperative to constantly improve policy initiatives on air quality in both high- and low-income countries.
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Article published in: Journal of Intensive Care (2015) 3:16
Examining the needs of at‐risk youth in the Middle East and North Africa: A multi‐method landscape analysis and systematic literature review
26 March 2021 Slideset updated regularly to include the latest data on the evolution and duration of COVID-19 symptoms and prevalence and duration of natural immunity.
Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are the second common cause of death in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) accounting for about 35% of all deaths, after a composite of communicable, maternal, neonatal, and nutritional diseases. Despite prior perception of low NCDs mortality rates, current evidence suggests t...hat SSA is now at the dawn of the epidemiological transition with contemporary double burden of disease from NCDs and communicable diseases. In SSA, cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) are the most frequent causes of NCDs deaths, responsible for approximately 13% of all deaths and 37% of all NCDs deaths. Although ischemic heart disease (IHD) has been identified as the leading cause of CVDs mortality in SSA followed by stroke and hypertensive heart disease from statistical models, real field data suggest IHD rates are still relatively low. The neglected endemic CVDs of SSA such as endomyocardial fibrosis and rheumatic heart disease as well as congenital heart diseases remain unconquered. While the underlying aetiology of heart failure among adults in high-income countries (HIC) is IHD, in SSA the leading causes are hypertensive heart disease, cardiomyopathy, rheumatic heart disease, and congenital heart diseases. Of concern is the tendency of CVDs to occur at younger ages in SSA populations, approximately two decades earlier compared to HIC. Obstacles hampering primary and secondary prevention of CVDs in SSA include insufficient health care systems and infrastructure, scarcity of cardiac professionals, skewed budget allocation and disproportionate prioritization away from NCDs, high cost of cardiac treatments and interventions coupled with rarity of health insurance systems. This review gives an overview of the descriptive epidemiology of CVDs in SSA, while contrasting with the HIC and highlighting impediments to their management and making recommendations.
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The Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study, a collaborative endeavour of the World
Health Organization (WHO), the World Bank and the Harvard School of Public Health,
drew the attention of the international health community to the burden of neurological
disorders and many other chronic conditions. T...his study found that the burden of neurological
disorders was seriously underestimated by traditional epidemiological and health
statistical methods that take into account only mortality rates but not disability rates. The
GBD study showed that over the years the global health impact of neurological disorders
had been underestimated.
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The chapter Fostering Health Systems’ Monitoring to Better Serve Older Populations is part of the publication series entitled Decade of Healthy Aging: Situation and Challenges. The publications are designed to favor the prioritization of effective actions at the local level as well as the monitori...ng of data and public health policies, and providing evidence-based information. Along with the objective of presenting the available updated knowledge about the situation of health and aging at the beginning of the Decade of Healthy Aging in the Americas, this publication gives information about health systems’ monitoring to better serve the needs of older adults and emphasizes the need for societies and health systems to better adapt to an aging population. It introduces the 360-tool as a guide to adapt health systems through monitoring tracers/indicators and highlighting the data and information that is readily available, disaggregated by age. This information can aid in decision-making and resource allocation to support older adults’ needs. Concerning the 360-tool development, a consensus has been reached on seven tracer indicators with high relevance to informing policy, and case studies in selected countries have assessed the feasibility of this approach. The list of indicators and the process related to the development of the tool are presented in this publication. The Decade of Healthy Aging 2021-2030 is a period to guide action towards the transformation of societies by fostering the inclusion of older people in every decision. This publication intends to contribute to this strategy and highlight the upcoming challenges and opportunities on healthy aging.
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A guide for community health workers, rehabilitation workers, and families.
This manual covers identifying primary and secondary disabilities, developing skills for daily living, and working through behavior problems. The new 2018 edition features new topics, including mental and developmental di...sabilities, microcephaly and Zika, causes of birth defects and childhood disability, epilepsy and seizures, hearing loss and vision problems, HIV, leprosy, and more, and has updated information on polio, cerebral palsy, juvenile arthritis, muscular dystrophy, and medications.
Readers will find instructions on how to build six different wheelchairs using local resources; useful therapy techniques, such as making fun and educational toys; ideas for improving playground accessibility for all children; and low-cost rehabilitation aids and adaptations for home and community.
You can download chapter 4 for free. The complete book is available at Hesperian Book STore
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A national faecal examination of 27 729 schoolchildren from 395 schools carried out in
2008 indicated that intestinal parasitic worms affected an estimated five million (56.8%)
children in Kenya. Existing evidence shows that worm infections lead to reduced literacy
levels due to impaired growth a...nd physical fitness.
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During the first two years of the project (2019–2020), through a ‘One Health’ approach, comprehensive engagement was established with AMR coordinating committees, WHO regional and country offices and SORT IT partners in Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas. Thirty-seven research studies were ...launched to inform AMR action plans in target country studies – local research, for local solutions, with local ownership.
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Sleeping sickness is controlled by case detection and treatment but this often only reaches less than 75% of the population. Vector control is capable of completely interrupting HAT transmission but is not used because of expense. We conducted a full scale field trial of a refined vector control tec...hnology. From preliminary trials we determined the number of insecticidal tiny targets required to control tsetse populations by more than 90%. We then carried out a full scale, 500 km2 field trial covering two HAT foci in Northern Uganda (overall target density 5.7/km2). In 12 months tsetse populations declined by more than 90%. A mathematical model suggested that a 72% reduction in tsetse population is required to stop transmission in those settings. The Ugandan census suggests population density in the HAT foci is approximately 500 per km2. The estimated cost for a single round of active case detection (excluding treatment), covering 80% of the population, is US$433,333 (WHO figures). One year of vector control organised within country, which can completely stop HAT transmission, would cost US$42,700. The case for adding this new method of vector control to case detection and treatment is strong. We outline how such a component could be organised.
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Working document from an informal consultation of experts. A Protocol for risk assessment at the field level. The purpose of document is to provide guidance on the methodology to be used for assessing, at field level, the yellow fever virus circulation in areas at risk, and is primarily intended fo...r public health specialists
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