The ouster of Bangladesh’s long-ruling Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in a student-led revolution this week could reverberate through the World Health Organization (WHO), where her daughter holds a key regional post. Saima Wazed, installed earlier this year as regional director for WHO’s South-East Asia (WHO-SEARO) office after a contested election, now faces increased scrutiny following […] Continue reading ->
India will contribute $85 million over a decade to the World Health Organization’s Global Traditional Medicine Center, the WHO announced. The center, located in the Indian western city of Jamnagar, aims to strengthen the evidence base for traditional medicine and provide data on related policies, practices and public use. The donation is part of a […] Continue reading ->
Climate change is endangering children’s health at every stage of development, threatening to reverse decades of progress in reducing child mortality worldwide, according to a new UNICEF report. The U.N. children’s agency’s “Threat to Progress” report released last week consolidates growing evidence of climate change’s effects on children’s health, identifying six major hazards: extreme heat, […] Continue reading ->
The lifesaving HIV treatment dolutegravir (DTG), used by 24 million people in low-and middle-income countries (LMICs), has unexpectedly contributed to a significant reduction in carbon emissions when compared to the previous standard of care, efavirenz, according to the latest report by global health initiative Unitaid. The report estimates that the transition to DTG will have […] Continue reading ->
A growing body of evidence from India is firmly establishing the country’s toxic levels of air pollution as a leading cause of ill health, particularly non-communicable diseases (NCDs). The results are significant because the country’s politicians have repeatedly questioned the validity of research that links air pollution with reduced life expectancy and worsening health. As […] Continue reading ->
The COVID pandemic brought into focus the life-saving role of medical oxygen – but the stock of oxygen is still severely limited in low- and middle-income countries, and many don’t know how much oxygen they need. Despite wide-ranging efforts to improve access to oxygen and oxygen delivery devices over the past four years, services in […] Continue reading ->
Progress on household electricity access suffered a setback for the first time in a decade – with 10 million more people lacking access in 2022 as compared to 2021, according to the 2024 Energy Progress Report released this week. As many as 685 million people were without electricity access in 2022. Some 2.1 billion people […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization’s 77th World Health Assembly passed a resolution on Wednesday calling on countries to bolster maternal and child health by expanding universal healthcare and strengthening primary healthcare, as progress in reducing maternal and child deaths has stagnated globally. The resolution, led by Somalia, commits countries to tackle the leading causes of maternal […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization (WHO) has urged stakeholders in the health sector to collaborate in reorienting health systems towards a primary healthcare approach, a key priority in helping more people access universal health coverage (UHC). The organization has also called on countries to increase domestic spending on health and for banks to fund climate and […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization plans to make climate change and its impact on health a major focus in the coming years, along with strengthening health systems, improving health equity and access, and preventing disease, according to the organization’s plan for its general program of work from 2025 to 2028. The four-year plan, known as GPW-14, […] Continue reading ->