The largest and most comprehensive study to date of the HIV prevention benefits of male circumcision for men who have sex with men (MSM) found that circumcision reduced the odds of HIV infection among this group by 42 percent in low- and middle-income countries, and overall by 23 percent. Image Credits: Avert/Gil Eilam/CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization and global partners wrapped up a meeting today to develop a vision and strategy prototype for the post-2020 decade of action on vaccines and immunizations. This new plan of action for 2021-2030 will take a different approach that is more “bottom up” and collaborative in engaging countries and other stakeholders to […] Continue reading ->
[By UN News] Safe water and access to proper sanitation are essential to eradicate poverty, build peaceful societies and ensure that no one is left behind on the path towards sustainable development, according to the 2019 UN World Water Development Report, launched on Tuesday in Geneva. Image Credits: UN Environment/ Hannah McNeish. Continue reading ->
In its first meeting, a carefully chosen advisory committee of experts on gene editing under the World Health Organization this week agreed on the immediate need for a global registry of research that funders should make binding for researchers. The group acknowledged an urgency in addressing human gene editing governance in light of work already taking place, but stopped short of calling for a moratorium at this time, instead issuing a statement that it would be "irresponsible" for anyone to proceed with such research now. Continue reading ->
A new report released today by the World Health Organization and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) found that while overall tuberculosis (TB) mortality and incidence rates have steadily fallen in the European region over the past decade, the disease should not be “underestimated.” The report warns that these rates are not sufficient to reach global targets for reducing the disease, further noting that while the European region may have only 2.8 percent of the world’s TB burden, it has 23 percent of the world’s burden of multi-drug resistant TB (MDR-TB). Continue reading ->
Bacteria and other pathogens that are resistant to common anti-microbial medications appear to be most abundant in Africa, as well as parts of South-East Asia and other developing regions with a poor record of sewage and sanitation management, according to a new study published in Nature Communications. Image Credits: Wikimedia Commons. Continue reading ->
Tobacco industry giants built some of the leading sugary drink brands that have been marketed to children over the past 50 years, reveals a major study published in The BMJ yesterday. Image Credits: The BMJ. Continue reading ->
Severe side effects make the current course of prolonged drug treatment difficult for many patients with Chagas disease, but a Phase II clinical trial in Bolivia may have found an alternative treatment that is both quicker and significantly safer. Image Credits: Ana Ferreira/DNDi. Continue reading ->
World Health Organization Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters today that WHO is “working to find a balance between protecting patients and staff from attacks by armed groups and building community trust and ownership” in managing the response to the deadly Ebola epidemic in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Image Credits: Gabriele François Casini/MSF. Continue reading ->
The UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs appears set to delay any consideration this year of a recent World Health Organization recommendation to reschedule the status of cannabis and cannabis-related substances from “particularly dangerous” to a less dangerous category – with no timeline indicated for when the Commission might actually take up the contentious issue. Image […] Continue reading ->