In the context of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic response, WHO identifies young people as a priority target audience with specific concerns, experiences and behaviours. This policy brief provides relevant insights from behavioural evidence and a set of behavioural considerations for tho...se promoting COVID-19 preventive behaviours among young people. Designers of programmes and initiatives targeting youth may find it helpful to refer to the youth-specific barriers and drivers identified in this policy brief and to prioritize these for testing when planning initiatives targeted at young people.
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Updated 17 April 2020
Improving care for women during pregnancy and around the time of childbirth to prevent and treat pre-eclampsia and eclampsia is a necessary step towards the achievement of the health targets of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Efforts to prevent and reduce morbidity a...nd mortality due to these conditions can help address the profound inequities in maternal and perinatal health globally. To achieve this, healthcare providers, health managers, policy makers and other stakeholders need up-to-date and evidence-informed recommendations to guide clinical policies and practices.
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This technical brief describes the re-affirmed WHO recommendation on ultrasound examination in the context of routine antenatal care and outlines policy and programme implications for translating this recommendation into action at the country level.
To support countries in adapting their response to different COVID-19 scenarios, the World Health
Organization (WHO) Department of Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health and Ageing commissioned this scoping review of published and grey literature. The objective was to identify interventions... implemented to maintain the provision and use of essential services for MNCAAH during disruptive events and to summarize lessons learned during these interventions. The review included outbreaks of Ebola virus disease (EVD), severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), Zika virus disease (ZVD), the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, and natural disasters and humanitarian emergencies that caused disruption to services, transport and other activities.
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The roadmap describes the actions needed to
achieve the three development goals for TB
vaccines set by the WHO:
1. A safe, effective and affordable TB vaccine
for adolescents and adults.
2. An affordable TB vaccine for neonates and
infants with improved safety and efficacy.
3. A therapeutic v...accine to improve TB
treatment outcomes
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Over the 20 years that followed, this unique partnership has invested more than US$53 billion, saving 44 million lives and reducing the combined death rate from the three diseases by more than half in the countries in which the Global Fund invests.
Building on Nigeria’s Call to Action to Save Newborn Lives, the Federal Ministry of Health (FMoH) has developed the National Strategy and Implementation Plan for Scale-up of Chlorhexidine. The Ministry incorporated existing maternal, newborn, and child health plans with additional comprehensive st...rategic planning and consultation to develop a comprehensive, five-year costed scale-up plan. The strategy and implementation plan is intended to guide programming, resource allocation, and commitments to achieve the national objective of Chlorhexidine uptake of 52% after the fifth year of national scaleup.
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Men lag behind women regarding use of HIV services and represent the majority of individuals living with uncontrolled HIV, advanced HIV, and who experience HIV-related mortality. Men (15+) globally are less likely than women (15+) to know their HIV status (83% for men vs 91% for women), be on antire...troviral treatment (ART) (72% for men vs 83% for women) and reach viral suppression (67% for men vs 78% for women).
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Development assistance for health (DAH) has grown substantially, totaling more than $31.3 billion in 2013. However, the degree that countries with high concentrations of armed conflict, ethnic violence, inequality, debt, and corruption have received this health aid and how that assistance might be d...ifferent from the funding provided to other countries has not been assessed.
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Donor government disbursements to combat HIV in low- and middle-income countries totaled US$8 billion in 2018, little changed from the US$8.1 billion total in 2017 and from the levels of a decade ago, finds a new report from the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) and the Joint United Nations Programme o...n HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS)
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The growing understanding of how sequence information can contribute to improved public health is driving global investments in sequencing facilities and programmes. The falling cost and complexity of generating GSD provides opportunities for expanding sequencing capacity; however, challenges to wid...espread implementation remain. This document provides policy-makers and stakeholders with guidance on how to maximize the public health benefit of SARS-CoV-2 genomic sequencing activities in the short and long term as the pandemic continues to unfold. Practical considerations for the implementation of a virus genomic sequencing programme and an overview of the public health objectives of genomic sequencing are covered. This guidance focuses on SARS-CoV-2 but is applicable to other pathogens of public health concern.
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This guidance note is meant to assist humanitarian actors, youth-led organizations, and young people themselves across sectors, working at local, country, regional, and global levels in their response to the novel coronavirus pandemic. It begins diagnostically, exploring the impacts of coronavirus d...isease (COVID-19) on young people. It then proposes a series of actions that practitioners and young people can take to ensure that COVID-19 preparedness, response plans and actions, are youth-inclusive and youth-focused – with and for young people. Recommendations are structured around the five key actions of the Compact for Young People in Humanitarian Action: services, participation, capacity, resources, and data. Where available, the recommended actions are accompanied by resources and concrete examples, which can inform approaches and support implementation
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Tsetse traps and targets (insecticide-impregnated screens) function by attracting the flies to a device that collects and/or kills them. Traps can be used for entomological surveillance, and also for control. Targets are simpler than traps, but are not used for surveillance. They are impregnated wit...h biodegradable insecticides in order to kill any flies that alight on them. Traps can also be impregnated with insecticides. Traps and targets can both be used to eliminate a fraction of the tsetse population.
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Anaemia is a serious global public health problem that particularly affects young children, menstruating adolescent girls and women, and pregnant and postpartum women. It is a condition in which the number of red blood cells or the haemoglobin concentration within them is lower than normal, affectin...g the blood’s ability to carry oxygen to the body’s tissues.
To reliably monitor the prevalence of anaemia at a population level, it is vital to measure the haemoglobin concentration in an accurate and precise way. In large-scale surveys, however, haemoglobin is most commonly measured using single-drop capillary blood specimens in point-of-care devices. Emerging evidence suggests that the use of single-drop capillary blood can introduce random and/or systematic errors, which may lead to inaccurate estimates, complicating effective anaemia programming.
This technical brief describes the current best practices for haemoglobin measurement, providing guidance to help plan or implement field surveys to assess anaemia at a population level. Continuing work to review emerging evidence is led by members of the WHO-UNICEF Technical Expert Advisory group on nutrition Monitoring (TEAM).
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Reproductive health needs are particularly acute in countries affected by armed conflict. Reliable information
on aid investment for reproductive health in these countries is essential for improving the efficiency and effectiveness of
aid. The purpose of this study was to analyse official developm...ent assistance (ODA) for reproductive health activities in
conflict-affected countries from 2003 to 2006.
Methods and Findings: The Creditor Reporting Syst
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Guidance statement
Recommendations on contraceptive methods used by
women at high risk of HIV
This study has been produced jointly by Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, a federally owned enterprise, implementing development programmes on behalf of the German Government, and CBM, a non-governmental organisation. Accordingly, its aim is to offer guidance to those in bo...th governmental and non-governmental organisations on development cooperation. Given the wide and differing range of implementation procedures, levels of intervention and organisational cultures, it is not a ready-to-be-applied toolbox with concrete blueprints for action. Rather, it raises awareness on core human rights and disability – inclusive principles. It explains and illustrates the implications of applying these principles to development practice. Practitioners can therefore use the guidance to initiate a process of consideration of how to embed these principles within their programmes.
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To provide information on trends on official development assistance (ODA) disbursement patterns for
reproductive health activities in 18 conflict-affected countries