Dirty Words: Save the Children’s “Dirty Word of the Week” Video series highlights sanitation and hygiene conditions at schools in developing countries

by ihsection, posted in Information and Social Media, Water, Sanitation, Hygiene

With the explosive growth of social media, these days it seems that every non-profit and NGO has its own blog, Twitter handle, YouTube account, and Facebook page, with some even venturing into Tumblr, MySpace, and Flickr (if you have never heard of these, don’t worry – I barely even know what Flickr is). One organization has done something pretty nifty (at least, I think so) with their YouTube account, though: Save the Children, which works in the U.S. and 41 other countries providing humanitarian relief, education, and other services to children, features a weekly video series called “Dirty Words.” These videos, narrated by its Director of School Health and Nutrition, Seung Lee, are 2-5 minutes long and highlight the water, sanitation and hygiene conditions at schools in developing countries, with simple solutions to address them. This week’s “dirty word” is worms – the video below shows a school in Nepal which has begun a program to provide de-worming medicines and iron to improve the health of the students.

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIN1-KB2EQA]

Thanks to Jennifer Segal, blogger at Endtheneglect.org, for bringing the series to my attention in her post on October 12.

KFF Video Explains Health Care Reform

by ihsection, posted in Health Systems, Information and Social Media, Policy and Advocacy

The Kaiser Family Foundation has made an animated video that explains the health care reform law in plain language.  Narrated by Cookie Roberts, a news commentator for ABC News and NPR, this nine-minute video goes over public opinion about the legislation and what will be done in its two main phases.  It is fairly balanced and clears up a lot of confusion (in my opinion).  The video can be seen on the KFF website here, and there is also a PDF transcript of the narration.

XVIII International AIDS Conference in Vienna this Week

by ihsection, posted in HIV/AIDS, Information and Social Media, Research

The XVIII International AIDS Conference, put on by the International AIDS Society, is being hosted in Vienna from July 18-23.  It is a place where HIV/AIDS scientists, policy makers, public health professionals, and other interest groups can gather to discuss the most current and relevant topics in HIV prevention and treatment.

The official conference webpage: http://www.aids2010.org/Default.aspx?pageId=160
Follow the conference on Twitter: http://twitter.com/aids2010
The Global Health Council’s blog series dedicated to the conference: http://www.globalhealthmagazine.com/aids_conference_blog/
Kaiser Family Foundation is the official webcaster for the event.  Visit their page dedicated to the conference here: http://globalhealth.kff.org/AIDS2010

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.