The first three weeks of 2023 were encouraging for the African continent’s fight against COVID-19. With cases down 97% year-on-year since the same period in 2022, hospitalizations for severe illness and deaths from the virus decreased significantly, the World Health Organization’s African Regional Office said. “For the first time since COVID-19 shook our lives, January […] Continue reading ->
In the past year alone, women’s use of contraception in 82 low- and lower-middle-income countries has averted more than 141 million unintended pregnancies, 29 million unsafe abortions and almost 150,000 maternal deaths. This is according to the global family planning partnership, FP2030, which released its 2022 Measurement Report on Wednesday. Today, 371 million women of […] Continue reading ->
While the World Health Organization’s (WHO) emergency committee on COVID-19 will decide this week whether the virus still constitutes a global health emergency, the body’s Director-General, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, is “very concerned” about the pandemic. “While I will not pre-empt the advice of the emergency committee, I remain very concerned by the situation in […] Continue reading ->
The new Brazilian government under President Lula da Silva intends to propose that the World Health Organization (WHO) addresses the health of indigenous people systematically, including by training indigenous health workers. Santiago Alcazar, the former head of WHO in Brazil, told a discussion convened by the Geneva Global Health Hub (G2H2) on Monday that Brazil […] Continue reading ->
Five billion people around the world have no protection against industrially produced trans fats (ITFAs), putting them at risk of heart disease and death, the World Health Organization said. ITFAs are responsible for over 500,000 premature deaths from coronary heart disease every year. Commonly found in baked goods, cooking oils, and packaged foods, ITFAs are […] Continue reading ->
DAVOS, Switzerland – The presidents of Switzerland and Ecuador led a call here at the World Economic Forum (WEF) Tuesday for greater international cooperation to fight plastic pollution, urging passage of a global treaty with tough regulations to confront a burgeoning environmental and health crisis from the ubiquitous material once seen as a symbol of […] Continue reading ->
Nearly one billion people in low- and middle-income countries lack access to health facilities with reliable electricity, a joint report by the World Health Organization (WHO), World Bank, and International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) found. Electricity is essential for the functioning of medical equipment like ventilators, incubators, and cold-chain storage for vaccines, as well as […] Continue reading ->
WHO’s Africa Region has declared the end to the recent outbreak of Sudan Ebolavirus – just a day before WHO convenes Ebola experts in a global consultation to explore a way forward on testing three candidate vaccines for the deadly Sudan strain of the virus. The oubreak was declared over after the elapse of 44 […] Continue reading ->
An estimated 7.1 million children and teens up to the age of 24 years died in 2021, according to a United Nations (UN) report released on Tuesday. Sub-Saharan Africa, Central and South Asia bore higher burden of these deaths than other regions. This includes five million children under the age of five and 2.1 million […] Continue reading ->
For months, Sharifa Shomale suffered in silence from tuberculosis, not knowing what was wrong with her. Doctors suspected a viral infection. Then an unlikely hero made a life-saving discovery: a mischievous rat named Hamisi. DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania—Every evening, as the call to prayer from the mosque echoes in the twilight from Manzese—a tangled Dar […] Continue reading ->
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