Global Health News Last Week

SECTION NEWS

The following announcement, from Eric Williams, calls for any IH section members interested in assisting efforts to address federal global health and HIV/AIDS funding.  Please see the text of the announcement below.  Eric can be contacted by e-mail at ericwms@gmail.com.

Dear Colleagues,

I’m writing to request assistance in a “grasstops” effort to address federal global health and HIV/AIDS funding. As you are likely well aware, there have been serious threats and concerns regarding global health funding over the last several years. There is a real need to mobilize influential members of our community in an effort to ensure that Congress does not backtrack on our global health commitments.

I am doing some consulting work with amfar and they want to identify experts, donors, high-profile individuals and/or organizations in select states who can reach out to key Senate leadership. We need these individuals/organizations to show and voice their support for continued and sustained commitments for global health.

States of focus include Nevada (Sen. Harry Reid), Iowa (Sen. Tom Harkin), and Washington (Sen. Patty Murray). We believe these senators are in key positions to influence appropriations decisions and sure up support for global health.

The aim of this effort is to:

1. identify grasstop individuals/organizations and
2. plan, coordinate, and carry out outreach efforts to Senate leadership in a variety of ways, including state-level meetings, Hill visits, op-eds, sign-on letters, and so forth.

If you are interested or able to provide assistance in helping to identify and/or reach out to the above stakeholders, I would be very interested in speaking. If there is strong support for this I would be happy to facilitate a conference call to discuss in full.

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August 19 was World Humanitarian Day.

POLITICS AND POLICY

• The CDC has made updates to its flu vaccination recommendations aimed at children and people with egg allergies.
• The United Nations has released a list of 248 organizations from 48 nations that are accredited to attend the UN High Level Meeting (HLM) on non-communicable diseases (NCDs) during September 19-20, 2011.  Meanwhile, as has been widely reported (including here and here), negotiations have stalled over an “outcomes document” that is to be approved at the meeting.
• The World Health Organization is calling for a ban on a common blood test for TB, saying the test is unreliable.
• Twenty-two children in Kancheepuram, Indiawho were not allowed to go to school because they are HIV positive have been ordered to return to school after a court ruled in favor of the students.
• International funding for HIV fell by 10 percent in 2010 from the previous year, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation and UNAIDS; activists worry that a continued reduction will undermine progress in global HIV prevention and treatment efforts.

PROGRAMS

• A study from Senegal published in the Lancet at the beginning of this month raises doubts over Gates’ plant to beat malaria, blaming mosquitoes’ growing resistance to insecticide and decreased immunity to malaria among the local population.
• The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Japan International Cooperation Agency have announced a strategic partnership to ensure continued progress in the fight against polio, including an innovative financing agreement to support polio-eradication efforts in Pakistan.
• USAID announced the expansion of its Indoor Residual Spraying program. The $189 million, there-year contract awarded by USAID to Abt. Associates will cover the implementation of IRS activities in Angola, Benin, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Ghana, Liberia, Madagascar, Mali, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
• WHO has released Psychological First Aid: Guide for Fieldworkers, a guide intended to provide field workers the tools to provide psycho-social support to themselves and those affected by a disaster or humanitarian crisis.
• The first comprehensive etiology study of childhood pneumonia in 3 decades has been launched. Pneumonia Etiology Research for Child Health (PERCH) will be a collaboration between sites in Africa, Asia and the International Vaccine Access Center at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

RESEARCH

• USAID has announced a partnership with the Infectious Disease Research Institute that will provide support for the research of a malaria vaccine at Walter Reed Army Institute of Research.
• UNDNJ researchers have discovered a link between TB and parasitic worms which act to thwart the body’s natural defenses against Mycobacterium tuberculosis.
• A Canadian study has found that a pregnant woman suffering from depression can lead to brain changes in their children.
• Researchers have identified 17 new antibodies with broad activity against HIV; some of which are 10 times more potent than previously discovered antibodies.
• The recent news about hiding vegetables by puréeing them and then adding them to recipes may make meals healthier, but if children don’t know they are eating vegetables, they won’t know to seek out those foods and eat them in future, says Isobel Hoskins on the CABI Global Health blog.
• Microcalorimeters may be the key to achieving TB diagnosis in a quicker and cheaper manner, say researchers in a recently published article in the Journal of Applied Microbiology.
• According to a recent UN study, 9 million lives can be saved over the next 10 years if average global salt consumption levels dropped by 15%.

DISEASES AND DISASTERS

• The WHO Says Libya is facing a medical supply crisis.
• The United Nations food agency called on Thursday for long-term aid for farmers in the Horn of Africa, saying constant crises in the region should shame the world.
• A report by the National Institute of Malaria research in Delhi has found that climate change will enable malaria to move to new areas.
• New research finds that radiation from the nuclear plant accident in Japanin March reached Californiawithin days, showing how quickly air pollution can travel, but scientists say the radiation will not hurt people.
• According to an article published in Science, 19 August, cases of Chagas disease are rising outside Latin America, because large numbers of people who are already infected are migrating fromLatin America.
• Len Rubenstein comments on the attacks on healthcare personnel inBahrain and the recent progress made to protect healthcare workers in conflict zones.

INFOGRAPHICS AND OTHER INTERESTING VISUALS

• Sarah Arnquist at the Global Health Hub has put together an open source timeline of global health milestones from the past century.
• The GAVI Alliance has released this infographic on the importance of childhood vaccines.
• This infographic on maternal mortality from Maternal Health Taskforce has caught the attention of Jen Quraishi at Mother Jones for the choice of data used to fill it out. She argues that comparing total maternal deaths rather than per capita rates makes it hard to assess nations side by side.

Thanks to Tom Murphy and Mark Leon Goldberg, Larry Johnson (filling in for Tom Paulson), Isobel Hoskins, and Jeff Meer.