December 9 was Anti-Corruption Day.
December 10 was Human Rights Day.
A recently published research study reveals that aspirin can prevent cancer – to very little acclaim.
There is a new rapid diagnostic test for TB, though some argue that it may not be the best idea for developing countries.
There is a polio outbreak in the Congo, and cholera rages on in Haiti and the Dominican Repubic.
I usually get restless on the last day of a given conference. It is really a shame, too: the presentations on the last day are just as interesting and important as those on the first, but by then I am already thinking of getting home, following up with connections made, and going through the business cards I picked up (and trying to find them on Linked In). Fortunately for me, two of the three global health hot topics were featured this morning: malaria and tuberculosis.
The session on malaria and vector-borne diseases featured several presentations on distributing insecticide-treated bed nets and their impact, as well as one that highlighted the importance of accurate diagnosis. I have been interested in malaria ever since I was an undergraduate student at Texas A&M, so I always attend sessions on malaria if they happen at a given conference, and it is always encouraging to see how much energy there is to fight it. (I took part in a student debate at the 2007 Entomological Society of America’s annual meeting, and I went to every vector-borne disease session they had.)
Up until that point, I’d had no coffee, so I gave in to my need for caffeine and bought an over-priced latte.
The TB session was also interesting, particularly because it is another area in which I have a lot to learn (though USAID’s Global Health eLearning Center has helped a lot with that). Despite being one of the top three global diseases, it has always seemed to be the red-headed stepchild of the three big killers – since HIV/AIDS and malaria always seem to dominate the news and be a whole lot sexier in general. The presentation on latent TB in a colonia in Baja California in particular stood out to me. During my work as a Pesticide Poisoning Surveillance Fellow at NIOSH last year, I drafted an article on pesticide poisoning in farm workers and learned quite a bit about their unique burdens. With all of the attention on our ongoing border “crisis” (or however it should be phrased), I think this will remain in the spotlight.
Unfortunately, I was unable to attend the Global Health Luncheon, as I had to catch the Sky Rail to the airport for my flight. If I find any coverage of it, I will be sure to post it here. (If you would like to cover it, dear reader, be sure to let me know!)
By Corinne Cohen
I am a resident in Family and Preventive Medicine, concurrently working towards getting my MPH. I attended the Community Based Primary Health Care (CBPHC) workshop at the American Public Health Association National Conference, which was organized by APHA’s International Health Section on October 25, 2008. Project Concern International (PCI) facilitated the workshop.
We opened by discussing the principles of the 1978 Alma-Ata Conference, which include health as a fundamental human right, equity, and the emphasis on community participation.
We engaged in several spirited group discussions about the role of CBPHC in our own work and ideas for effective behavior change. A highlight was a presentation on the use of TB-Photovoice (http://tbphotovoice.org/tbpv2/index.php?option=com_frontpage&Itemid=1), a powerful means for creating effective messages of change from those who are most affected by the disease. At the end of the workshop we broke into groups to discuss either the documentation and dissemination of work, how to increase funding, and how to advance knowledge of CBPHC. My group was comprised of documenters and disseminatorsand we discussed starting a new journal that is a forum for talking about projects that are in the works or have been completed — this would allow newcomers to avoid reinventing the wheel, would serve as a forum for old hats to bounce ideas off each other around what did and didn’t work in their projects, and would also provide powerful individual stories, photos, videos, etc. that would assist with funding. The forum would be online, open access and free. Start up funding for such a new journal is actively pursued and hopefully we can capitalize on that. Wikipedia sounded like an option as well. Also, we want to try to connect students and young professionals with project managers so that we can recruit writers! Community-Campus listserv may be the way to go for that connection.
Overall, the workshop was stimulating and exciting – an opportunity to gather a collection of dedicated and passionate professionals to share ideas and projects that serve a common goal.
IH CONNECT 