The importance of community and civil society engagement to end TB has been highlighted in various strategies and global commitments. The WHO End TB Strategy, aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, emphasizes the role of communities and civil society in ending the TB epidemic... by 2030. Furthermore, the political declaration of the 2023 United Nations High-level Meeting on TB highlights the need to ensure people-centred health services, with meaningful engagement of communities in the full spectrum of TB response.
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Kangaroo mother care (KMC) is a critical strategy to care for preterm and low birth weight infants in resource-limited settings. Despite evidence of its effectiveness and low cost, coverage has remained low, largely due to sociocultural barriers. We aimed to better understand social norms and commun...ity perceptions of preterm infants and KMC (facility-initiated and community-continued) in Malawi, a country with a high preterm birth rate, to inform a pilot social and behavior change program.
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Screening areas, treatment centres and community facilities are part of the strategic priorities for Severe Acute Respiratory Infection (SARI) outbreak preparedness, readiness and response. The SARI Facilities training package has been developed to meet the operational needs emerging with the COVID-...19 pandemic.
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This document outlines minimum requirements of laboratory testing for COVID-19 and link laboratory testing with surveillance and contact tracing to guide the outbreak response by national health authorities using a reduced number of tests performed. The strategies are organized according to stages o...f transmission: (1) No cases reported or observed (Stage 0); (2) Imported cases (Stage 1); (3) Localized community transmission (Stage 2); (4) Large-scale community transmission (Stage 3). For each stage, the recommended approaches indicate which testing strategy to prioritize when there are severe limitations on laboratory testing. The document is based on the current epidemiology of COVID-19 and available molecular testing methods.
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Addressing comorbidities and risk factors for TB is a crucial component of Pillar one of the End TB Strategy, which focuses on integrated patient-centred care and prevention, including action on TB and comorbidities. The Framework for collaborative action on TB and comorbidities aims to support coun...tries in the evidence-informed introduction and scale-up of holistic people-centred services for TB, comorbidities and health-related risk factors, with the goal of comprehensively addressing TB and other co-existing health conditions. It should be used in conjunction with relevant WHO guidelines. The Framework is intended for use by people working in ministries of health, other relevant line-ministries, policymakers, international technical and funding organizations, researchers, nongovernmental and civil society organizations, as well as primary care workers, specialist health practitioners, and community health workers who support the response to TB and comorbidities in both the public and private sectors.
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More than 700 000 people lose their life to suicide every year. The world is not on track to reach the 2030 suicide reduction targets. WHO advocates for countries to take action to prevent suicide, ideally through a comprehensive national suicide prevention strategy. Governments and communities can ...contribute to suicide prevention by implementing LIVE LIFE – WHO’s approach to starting suicide prevention so that countries can build on it further to develop a comprehensive national suicide prevention strategy. The guide is for all countries, with or without a national suicide prevention strategy; national or local focal points for suicide prevention, mental health, alcohol or NCDs; and community stakeholders with a vested interest or who may already be engaged in implementing suicide prevention activities.
Excecutive Summary available in English, French, Arabic, Chinese, Russian and Spanisch here:
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Course information
Yaws is targeted for eradication by WHO in the 2021-2030 NTD Roadmap. It is therefore crucial to know how to identify cases, design and implement activities to eradicate the disease at the community level.
In the context of integration of skin NTDs it is vital to learn to recogn...ize a disease targeted for eradication. At the individual level yaws lesions may mimic other skin diseases. At the community level, it is key to know how to design and implement the total community treatment strategy and monitor its impact. This course aims at providing health workers with the basic knowledge to understand the epidemiology, diagnosis, treatment, impact, eradication strategy and reporting of yaws.
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3rd edition. In 2001, Uganda adapted the Integrated Disease Surveillance and Response (IDSR) developed by World Health Organization (WHO) for member states in African region. The Ministry of Health has been implementing the IDSR strategy since then with success across the country. This strategy prov...ides the opportunity for rational use of resources and maximises investments in health surveillance systems. The 3rd edition IDSR guidelines incorporates lessons learnt from previous
epidemics, new frameworks like the Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA), One Health, Disaster Risk Management (DRM), the WHO regional strategy for health security and emergencies, and the rising non-communicable diseases, and aims to strengthen implementation of IHR (2005) core surveillance and response capacities. These guidelines have been adapted to reflect national priorities, policies and public health structures; and shall be used in conjunction with other similar
guidelines/strategies or initiatives.
Overall, the 3rd edition technical guidelines will incorporate the following:
• Strengthening Indicator Based Surveillance
• Strengthening Event Based Surveillance
• Improving community-based disease surveillance
• Improving Cross Border Surveillance and response
• Scaling up e-IDSR implementation
• Improving reporting and information sharing platforms
• Improved data sharing across sectors
• Tailoring IDSR to Emergency or Disaster contexts
The 3rd edition guidelines are intended for use as:
• A general reference for surveillance activities across all levels
• A set of definitions for thresholds that trigger some action for response
• A stand-alone reference for level-specific guidelines on surveillance and response
• A resource for developing training, supervision and evaluation of surveillance activities
• A guide for improving early detection and preparedness for outbreak response.
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Sequencing SARS-CoV-2 in the Americas
The COVID-19 Genomic Surveillance Regional Network was created in 2020 not only to strengthen the sequencing capacity in the participating laboratories, but also for them to establish a routine SARS-CoV-2 genomic sequencing, as a strategy to increase the amoun...t of genetic sequence data available to the global community, which is critical to support the development of diagnostic protocols, the information for vaccine development and to better understand the evolution and molecular epidemiology of the SARS-CoV-2.
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This intervention will be limited to the initial phase of India reporting only (i) travel related cases and (ii) focal clusters arising from a travel related/unrelated case where cluster containment strategy is adopted (iii) Persons coming from COVID-19 affected areas where local and community trans...mission is evident.
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The Infection prevention and control in the context of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19): a living guideline consolidates technical guidance developed and published during the COVID-19 pandemic into evidence-informed recommendations for infection prevention and control (IPC). This living guideline... is available both online and PDF.
**This version of the living guideline (version 5.0) **includes the following seven revised statements for the prevention, identification and management of SARS-CoV-2 infections among health and care workers:
a good practice statement on national and subnational testing strategies;
a good practice statement on passive syndromic surveillance of health and care workers;
a good practice statement on prioritizing health and care workers for SARS-CoV-2 testing;
a good practice statement on protocols for reporting and managing health and care worker exposures;
a good practice statement to limit in-person work of health and care workers with active SARS-CoV-2 infections;
a statement on high-risk exposures and quarantine; and,
a conditional recommendation on the duration of isolation for health and care workers.
Understanding the updated section
Prevention of infections in the health care setting includes a multi-pronged and multi-factorial approach that includes IPC and occupational health and safety measures and adherence to Public Health and Social Measures in the community by the health workforce. The underlying infection prevention and control strategy of this section is the notion that early identification of symptomatic cases, testing and quarantining/isolating health and care workers decreases the risk of nosocomial infection to patients and to other health and care workers.
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In the context of the Support to National Malaria Control Programme (SuNMaP), demand creation is the strategic combination of advocacy, communication and mobilisation approaches that seek to achieve increased community awareness of, and demand for, effective malaria prevention and treatment services.... For malaria treatment, demand creation focuses on promoting improved testing, prompt and proper use of artemisinin combination therapy (ACT) treatment for individual cases of malaria, and effective home management of fever, together with referrals of severe cases to a higher-level health facility.
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The core of the strategy is the goal for all patients to have better overall care, so that the numbers of deaths and cases of disability are reduced by 50% before 2030. For this to be achieved, four strategic aims will be pursued.
Empower and engage communities,
Ensure safe, effective tre...atment,
Strengthen health systems, and
Increase partnerships, coordination and resources Strong collaboration
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UNICEF Annual Report 2017 - Burkina Faso
- Healthcare policy for children
- Food insecurity
- Community health strategy
- National child protection system
etc.
This flipchart is a visual support for community workers, health workers, emergency workers, and in general all staff conducting face-to-face communication in response to a cholera outbreak.
How to use it?
The flipchart is intended as a support for animating individual or group discussions on ...life-saving practices.
To facilitate involvement of communities for an effective response to the outbreak, this flipchart should be used to provide information and stimulate discussion, rather than to “pass messages”.
An integrated communication approach
The flipchart should not be used alone; effective communication strategy involves the use of a variety of channels and actors. It will be critical to integrate face-to-face discussion with other channels such as local radios, schools, mosques, churches, etc., and to associate different actors such as technical experts, community representatives and opinion leaders to animate them.
In emergency context it is critical not only to stimulate discussion but also to create mechanisms for interaction between communities and service providers such as regular meetings, participation to radio broadcasts or visits by community representatives to health posts; these mechanisms need to be carefully catered for with appropriate planning and resources.
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Preventing Physical Impairment in Childhood CBM Strategy Overview | Laminated flip charts | These are the main implementing tools in the prevention program, developed as A4 sized booklets which can be carried easily. They constitute the basic information a community rehabilitation worker needs to co...nvey to caregivers, primary health providers and other appropriate user groups. They are primarily visually presented, taking into consideration audiences with limited literacy, with three or four bullet points per page for the community workers to reinforce. The drawings can also be printed on A1 sized flip charts.
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23 February 2022
A summary of the commitments and targets within the United Nations General Assembly’s 2021 Political Declaration on HIV and AIDS.The United Nations General Assembly’s 2021 Political Declaration on AIDS features bold global commitments and targets for 2025 that are ambitious but... achievable if countries and communities follow the evidence-informed guidance within the Global AIDS Strategy 2021–2026. This UNAIDS publication provides a summary of those commitments and targets to get every country and every community on-track to end AIDS as a public health threat by 2030
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The importance of robust mortality surveillance systems cannot be overstated in an era marked by increasing global health challenges where health threats loom large and population dynamics continue to evolve. Accurate and timely mortality data is essential for identifying trends and detecting emergi...ng health threats, evaluating the impact of interventions, and guiding evidence-based policy decisions.
This framework outlines a holistic approach to strengthening routine mortality surveillance systems, considering the unique contextual factors and challenges faced by African countries. It emphasizes the importance of establishing efficient data collection mechanisms, enhancing data quality and completeness, and promoting data sharing and collaboration among stakeholders.
Moreover, the framework recognizes the pivotal role of technology in the integration of data from fragmented mortality data sources. It highlights the potential of innovative data capture methods, advanced analytics, and real-time reporting systems to enhance mortality data’s accuracy, efficiency, and timeliness.
The continental framework for mortality surveillance aligns with Africa CDC’s mission and strategic goal by serving as a fundamental component in strengthening public health systems, enhancing disease surveillance capacities and capabilities, informing evidence-based policies and interventions, and promoting collaboration and coordination among African countries to address health challenges and improve health outcomes on the continent.
The successful implementation of this framework requires collective commitment and concerted efforts from governments, health institutions, and the international community. We hope this document will serve as a catalyst for transformative change, enabling countries to build resilient mortality surveillance systems that protect public health, save lives, and contribute to evidence-based decision-making.
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Countries, partners, and donors are committed to
the global elimination of blinding trachoma by 2020.
Achieving this public health milestone requires more
than funding; it requires health personnel with the
right mix of skills, and well supported and managed
health systems. Mass drug administra...tion (MDA)
with Zithromax®, the Pfizer, Inc. donated antibiotic,
is a key component of the SAFE strategy, endorsed
by the World Health Organization. There is growing
recognition that improving all aspects of MDA, from
planning to training, recording to reporting, and
receipt of drug to distribution (the supply chain), will
be necessary if MDA programmes are going to reduce
the community burden of Chlamydia trachomatis, and
eliminate trachoma as a cause of blindness by 2020.
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Current and expected problems such as ageing, increased prevalence of chronic conditions and multi-morbidity, increased emphasison healthy lifestyle and prevention, and substitution for care from hospitals by care provided in the community encourage countries worldwide to develop new models of prima...ry care delivery. Owing to the fact that many tasks do not necessarily require the knowledge and skills of a doctor, interest in using nurses to expand the capacity of the primary care workforce is increasing. Substitution of nurses for doctors is one strategy used to improve access, efficiency, and quality of care. This is the first update of the Cochrane review published in 2005.
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