Category: News

Global Health News This Week

by ihsection, posted in News

November 22 was Public Health Thank-You Day, and November 25 marked the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

UNAIDS released a report that said that we are finally making significant progress against the global HIV/AIDS epidemic. In related news, an international trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that daily prophylaxis can prevent HIV infection in MSM.

The Bread for the World Institute released its 2011 Hunger Report, which says that global hunger is increasing as the global food crisis gets worse.

A study published in the Lancet found that the malaria death toll in India may be as much as 13 times higher than WHO estimates.

Another study published in the journal Vaccine estimated that global polio eradication could save the world $50 billion.

The strain responsible for the cholera outbreak in Haiti has been identified as one originating from southeast Asia, which has led many Haitians to blame the Nepalese UN peacekeepers and has sparked riots against the UN.

In the news this week: Global Health News

by ihsection, posted in News

World Toilet Day was on November 19.

Pope Benedict XVI made waves with a comment from an interview over the summer that condom use could be “morally justified” in certain cases.

The first Global Symposium on Health System Research was held this week in Montreux, Switzerland, and has been covered by NYU’s Karen Grepin and CGD’s Nandini Oomman.

Haiti’s cholera epidemic has reached the Dominican Republic.

The largest study yet on malaria treatment for children, published in the Lancet, proves that artesunate is a much more effective drug than quinine, which prompts the Guardian’s Sarah Boseley to ask why more doctors aren’t prescribing it.

World Health Assembly 2010: Code of Practice on international recruitment of health personnel adopted!

by ihsection, posted in Information and Social Media, News

63rd World Health Assembly Adopts Historic Code of Practice to Curb Aggressive Recruitment of Health Personnel from Poor Countries to Rich Countries

Geneva, 20 May 2010. In only the second time in its history, the United Nations’ World Health Assembly voted tonight in Geneva at 8 pm to adopt a voluntary code directing nations to employ more ethical practices in relation to a major international health problem.  The Code of Practice on the International Recruitment of Health Personnel sets forth ten articles advising both source and destination countries on how to regulate the recruitment of health personnel in a way that mitigates damage to low-income countries struggling to meet the basic health needs of their populations in a setting of serious workforce deficits.

Read the media release from the Health Workforce Advocacy Initiative (HWAI) and of the Global Health Workforce Alliance (GHWA) on Medicus Mundi International’s website.

World Health Assembly 2010: CODE of PRACTICE Emerges from Committee

by hagopian, posted in Information and Social Media, News

It looks like the Code of Practice on the International Recruitment of Health Personnel may pass out of the World Health Assembly before we adjourn on Friday.  When it comes up, Dr. Amy Hagopian will testify on behalf of the Global Health Council.

There are a lot of heroes in this story.  The most recent bearers of the torch are the hard-working and high-stamina delegates from low-income countries and their delegate friends in solidarity from Norway, the European Union as headed by Spain, Sweden, and other right-thinking countries (or are those left-thinking countries?). Read more about the latest developments at Blog 4 Global Health.

World health Assembly 2010: Update on health worker code

by hagopian, posted in Information and Social Media, News

There was late-breaking news at the World Health Assembly on Monday with regard to the Code of Practice on the International Recruitment of Health Personnel. The Spanish delegation made a late afternoon motion in Committee A to move the code OFF the agenda for a Tuesday vote, and instead to send it to a drafting committee for improvements. Read Dr. Amy Hagopian’s post at Blog 4 Global Health.