Global Health Weekly News Round-up

Politics and Policies

• The US federal government has awarded Iowa $7 million to prepare a computerized system that will help the small businesses and individuals to find affordable coverage. (Source: http://blogs.desmoinesregister.com/dmr/index.php/2011/11/29/feds-give-state-7-million-for-insurance-exchange-planning/ )
• US federal agency has rejected Indiana’s bid for an exemption from federal health care. (Source: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505245_162-57332830/feds-reject-ind-request-for-health-care-exemption/ )
• The House of Delegates, at its interim meeting in November, directed the AMA to use screening tools from the National Institute of Drug Abuse and others to identify the patients likely to abuse prescription drugs.                                                                                                                  (Source: http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2011/11/28/prsd1128.htm )
• From December 7-9, 2011, Kenya will hold its first national human resources for health conference which will avail a platform for placing health as a priority in the health strategy and national development towards vision 2030. The theme of the conference will be “Renewing commitment to the health workforce towards achievement of MDGs and vision 2030”. (Source: http://allafrica.com/stories/201111291193.html )
• AstraZeneca Canada Inc., in partnership with mindyourbody and Physical and Health Educators (PHE) of Canada, together with the active involvement of the youth, has organized a program in Ontario, Canada. It is focused on improving the mental health and emotional well-being of vulnerable adolescents. (Source: http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/505390 )
• The Capital Metropolitan Transportation Authority will be posting no smoke signs within 15 feet of bus stops in Austin, Texas, beginning from February 1^st 2012 to prevent the non-smokers from inhaling the secondhand smoke. (Source: http://www.dailytexanonline.com/opinion/2011/11/28/capmetros-policy-breath-fresh-air )
• A recent study done by Dr. Avi Dor, professor in the Department of Health Policy at the GW School of Public Health and Health Services indicates a need to develop policies to encourage medication compliance which will lead to cost savings through healthcare system in the long run. (Source: http://www.newswise.com/articles/higher-patient-adherence-to-disease-modifying-therapies-reduced-costs-for-ms-patients )
• An invitation for the bid for consultant on public health authorities’ activities with the aim to protect the environment has been issued by the Ministry of Health of Azerbaijan. (Source: http://abc.az/eng/news_29_11_2011_60039.html )

Programs

• The first WHO European Conference on the New European Policy for Health – Health 2020, held in Jerusalem, Israel has called for working together across sectors for health and well-being. (Source: http://www.epha.org/spip.php?article4859 )
• In the 44^th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Nephrology, it was said that Healthy People 2010 met the goal of lower CVD deaths in CKD patients. (Source: http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/754362 )
• The Global Fund will not be able to fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria until the year 2014. (Source: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-202_162-57331033/massive-global-health-fund-says-its-broke/ )

Research

• A study done by a team at Harvard University involving stem cell transplant in the brain circulatory of mice could pave a way for effective treatment of Parkinson’s disease and autism. (Source: http://www.thehindu.com/health/medicine-and-research/article2659553.ece )
• According to a study done by the scientists at Indiana School of Medicine in Indianapolis, playing video games can make you aggressive. The research showed that the areas of the brain most affected were the left inferior frontal lobe and the anterior cingulate cortex. Once the gamers stopped playing, these areas of brain came back to normal. (Source: http://www.hindustantimes.com/Lifestyle/Wellness/Violent-video-games-make-you-aggressive/Article1-775010.aspx )
• In a recent study done by scientists at Harvard School of Public Health, a relationship was found between coffee consumption and rate of occurrence of endometrial cancer. They found an inverse relationship and found that the women who drank four or more cups of coffee had significant reduction (25%) in the risk of endometrial cancer than those who limit themselves to one cup of coffee per day. (Source: http://www.hindustantimes.com/Lifestyle/Wellness/Four-cups-of-coffee-can-prevent-womb-cancer/Article1-773052.aspx )
• The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has developed a new wet AMD drug known as EYLEA. This drug, when injected into the eye, will prevent the growth of abnormal blood vessels in the eye under retina to prevent their bleeding and preventing an abnormal blood loss. (Source: http://www.ffb.ca/research/research_news/eyelea.html )
• A new treatment for severe emphysema has been brought to light by the team of doctors at Thoraxklinik in Heidelberg, Germany. They used first endoscopic lung volume reduction system known as InterVapor that does not leave any foreign materials in the lungs but utilizes the body’s self-healing process for the treatment of this problem. (Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/11/29/idUS125291+29-Nov-2011+PRN20111129 )

Diseases and Disasters

• According to a CDC report, of the 1.2 million Americans who have HIV, 20% are unaware of their status. (Source: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_162-57333212-10391704/cdc-240000-americans-have-hiv-and-dont-know-it/?tag=pop;stories )
• Egyptian scientists prepare an anti-diabetes drug from balsam pear. It has properties similar to bovine insulin and it will be taken orally, which will be a relief for the patients on insulin injections. (Source: http://www.dawn.com/2011/11/29/egyptian-scientists-to-make-diabetes-drug-from-bitter-fruit.html )
• The 2010 data indicates that in India, the state of Andhra Pradesh has the highest prevalence of HIV/ AIDS. (Source: http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Hyderabad/article2663262.ece )
• Nearly 6% of the population of Pakistan (about 10 million people) are infected with hepatitis C (Source: http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011%5C11%5C28%5Cstory_28-11-2011_pg7_4 )
• The children in South Sudan are dying of preventable diseases. According to the UN, malaria is a hyper-epidemic in this country. It is said to be one of the biggest causes of miscarriage in pregnancy. (Source: http://www.iol.co.za/news/africa/s-sudan-children-dying-of-preventable-diseases-1.1188555 )
• The countries in East Africa have been hit by the nanana wilt and the Cassava Brown Streak disease which has affected the household incomes and raised the famine threat. A warning has been issued by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). (Source: http://digitaljournal.com/article/315074 )

These headlines were compiled by Vani Nanda, MPH Candidate at West Chester University PA.

Global Health News Last Week

SECTION NEWS
Attention IH section members! We are still in need of moderators for the scientific sessions at this year’s annual meeting. According to our program committee, the following sessions are still available:

Monday, October 31
10:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.: International Health Programs & Policy 1

2:30 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.: Act Global, Think Local: Domestic applications of international health lessons; Child Survival & Child Health 1

Tuesday, November 1
8:30 a.m. to 10:00 a.m.: Builidng Partnerships and Coalitions for better International Programs; Emerging, Re-emerging & Neglected Tropical Diseases

10:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.: International Health Communication/ Behavior Change Communication

12:30 p.m. 2:00 p.m.: HIV/AIDS 2

Wednesday, November 2
8:30 a.m. to 10:00 a.m.: HIV/AIDS 3; Innovations in International Health 2

Please contact Omar Khan (ih.apha@gmail.com) for more information, or to volunteer!

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USAID celebrated its 50-year anniversary this week.

The benefits of breastfeeding are being showcased around the world
for Breast Feeding Week.

POLITICS AND POLICY

• US organizations will find it easier to deliver aid to parts of Somalia controlled by a pro-Al Qaeda group – the threat of prosecution if it ends up in the wrong hands has been reduced  after an announcement by the State Department.
• Dr. Ariel Pablos-Méndez was sworn in as the new Assistant Administrator for the Global Health Bureau at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).
• Although Congress resolved the debt ceiling debate, the way the budget package is being shaped — particularly by combining International Affairs with defense in a single “security” category, global poverty spending is getting severely handicapped.
• Blood tests for tuberculosis (TB) diagnosis may be putting patients’ lives at risk through providing misleading results, and should not be used, according to a WHO policy statement.

PROGRAMS

• The inaugural charter of the Alliance for Oral Health Across Borders was signed at Temple University yesterday.
• Tom Paulson of Humanosphere breaks down the 2010 Gates Foundation annual report, with some interesting commentary.
• Jaclyn Schiff of UN Dispatch says we can look for more global health leadership coming from the city of Houston (my hometown!), as Dr. Peter Hotez, whom Schiff calls “an international health force of nature,” and an arm of the Sabin Vaccine Institute move there.
• The Measles Initiative today announced it has helped vaccinate one billion children in more than 60 developing countries since 2001, making significant gains in the global effort to stop measles.
• India’s health minister announced Tuesday a new initiative underway to boost the country’s rate of immunizing newborns by collecting mobile phone numbers of all pregnant mothers to monitor their babies’ vaccinations.

RESEARCH

• A multi-resistant strain of Salmonella Kentucky could be spreading globally, suggests a study by Institut Pasteur. Case numbers have risen in Europe and the US, and infections have also been acquired in various parts of Africa and the Middle East. The strain has also been found in food animals in Africa.
• Pharmaceutical manufacturer iBio, Inc announced the successful animal testing of a malaria vaccine candidate in trials sponsored by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
• A new study in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene shows a relationship between a kind of river flow and cholera outbreaks.
• A new study in the Lancet shows that text messaging can be an effective tool in malaria treatment and prevention.
• PLoS Medicine published a new study on HIV/AIDS in the Middle East and North Africa. Among its key findings was the startling fact that sex between men (MSM) accounts for nearly one quarter of all new HIV infections across the region.
• According to a new study, children of depressed mothers in developing countries are 40 percent more likely to be underweight or stunted than those with mothers in good mental health.
• A cheap and portable blood test could provide a breakthrough for diagnosing infections in remote areas of the world, a scientific study says.
• Using WHO data, researchers found that children who experience abuse and develop mental health disorders are at increased risk for chronic physical problems later in life.
• A new study in the journal Nature Medicine finds that a credit card shaped device used for testing HIV, known as “Lab-on-a-Chip,” has had a successful trial run in Rwanda.

DISEASES AND DISASTERS

• Mass treatment of river blindness and lymphatic filariasis with ivermectin has been hampered by severe reactions if the patient also has Loa loa. A new map developed by WHO’s African Programme for Onchocerciasis Control will help communities identify low risk areas for Loa loa and distribute ivermectin for lymphatic filariasis control safely.
• The CDC reports that the annual number of HIV infections in the USA is holding steady at about 50,000, and that African American MSM are at particular risk.
• AIDS remains a metaphor for inequality, argues Michel Sidibe in the LA Times. In the world’s wealthier nations, where access to medicine is widespread, AIDS is becoming a chronic disease rather than a death sentence. But in the eveloping world, 1.8 million people die of AIDS each year.
• Global cholera incidence has increased since 2000, with Haiti’s large outbreak tipping the largest burden away from Africa for the first time since 1995, the World Health Organization (WHO) said Sunday.
• Tens of thousands of Somalis have died and more than half-a-million children are on the brink of starvation. Western aid isn’t flowing to where the worst of the famine is — partly due to the “war on terror.”
• The head of World Food Program in Ethiopia says the country’s emergency food stocks are almost gone, the latest trouble caused by the drought in the Horn of Africa.

TOTALLY UNRELATED TO ANYTHING – Apparently Hollywood has discovered its next Greg Mortenson: Sam Childers, the “Machine Gun Preacher,” is the subject of much hubbub and an upcoming movie starring Gerard Butler.  This man claims to have been a gangbanger and drug dealer who found Jesus and then took up arms to rescue child soldiers from the LRA.  Global health blogger Brett Keller offers some commentary into Childers’ outlandish (and, frankly, dubious) story, while anonymous aid blogger “J” at Tales from the Hood has a few choice words.

Global Health News Last Week

The Supercourse team at the University of Pittsburgh has taken the initiative to spread the WHO’s definition of health, “a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.”  They have translated the definition into over 60 different languages using Google translate and have asked health professionals to review them to make sure they are correct.  This global health knowledge campaign is being developed by the Supercourse team, WHO Collaborating Centre, University of Pittsburgh.  Please contact Dr. Ronald LaPorte, Director, Professor of Epidemiology, University of Pittsburgh, for more information.

July 28 was the first-ever World Hepatitis Day.

POLITICS AND POLICY

• As the UN gears up for its Summit on Non-Communicable Diseases this September, blogger Michael Hodin argues that by focusing on this issue, the world body has a “new shot at relevance” in an era where its importance is decreasing (and countries contemplate cutting its funding).
• Former U.S. Ambassador on HIV/AIDS Jack Chow says the CIA’s fake vaccination scheme in Pakistan, aimed at locating Osama Bin Laden, threatens to undermine a broad set of American global health initiatives.
• The U.S. government and the Gates Foundation were responsible for 85% of the steep increase in malaria funding between 2007 and 2009. Richard Tren argues that we need to diversify funding sources and focus on control efforts.

PROGRAMS

• The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has teamed up with FC Barcelona to promote the polio eradication campaign.
• To raise awareness about violence against women in Europe, the UN has opened up a contest to design a newspaper advertisement in support of the UN Secretary-General’s UNiTE to End Violence against Women campaign. View submissions and the winning entries here.
• Seattle-based development blogger Tom Paulson continues to raise some interesting issues regarding the Gates Foundation’s funding of media coverage for global health issues.  Their latest venture is a weekly program on the BBC.

RESEARCH

• Researchers have cracked the DNA code of the strain of E. coli that originated in German sprouts and killed over 50 people this summer.
• A cell phone that doubles as a blood-oxygen tester is one of the 77 mHealth innovation finalists for the Saving Lives at Birth: A Grand Challenge for Development competition.
• A study conducted by the WHO found that France, the U.S., the Netherlands, and India have the highest rates of depression in the world, while China has the lowest.  Detailed interviews were conducted with over 89,000 individuals in 18 countries.
• It is becoming more apparent that one of the most effective ways to deal with HIV/AIDS is to address neglected tropical diseases, argues the Public Library of Science in Eureka Alert.
• A study of the lifespan of HIV patients receiving combination ARV therapy by researchers at University of Ottawa has found that patients can expect to live a near normal lifespan.
• Researchers at Oklahoma University believe that a protein-based vaccine could prevent many cases of childhood pneumonia.
• Dutch researchers have found that children who were not breastfed were more likely to develop respiratory problems such as asthma.
• The first stage of trials for a new malaria vaccine by Swiss researchers in Tanzania have shown promising results.
• Has announced in a study in Pediatrics that the varicella vaccine for chickenpox has reduced the annual death toll in the United States from 105 to 14. Tests are in progress that could lead to major family planning advances. The New York Times reports on some innovations in male contraceptives that could offer safe and effective contraception.

DISEASES AND DISASTERS

• The Agbogbloshie slum outside of Accra, Ghana, is a major electronics waste dump.  This site is an example of what happens to “donated” discarded electronics: residents burn them to extract precious metals and simultaneously exposed to a host of hazardous chemicals, as the goods release lead, mercury,
  thallium, hydrogen cyanide, and PVC.
• A recent article by a global panel uses startling images to call attention to the woeful state of neglect and inadequate treatment of mental illness in developing nations.

Global Health News Last Week

POLITICS AND POLICY

• Attacks on aid workers are on the increase and one writer believes this largely due to the current “integrated mission” focus of the UN and other donors.
• If the Global Fund is to avoid further adverse media coverage and further consequent donor nervousness, it must urgently implement a more effective and fine-tuned approach to the issues of corruption and transparency.
• The families of two women who died in childbirth are starting a legal action against the government of Uganda, alleging that the inadequate care and facilities provided for pregnant women caused the deaths and violates their country’s constitution and women’s rights to life and health.
• The results of a recent bombshell study revealing the impact of taking ARVs and the spread of HIV has the Obama administration doing some serious pondering over the impact of a policy change.
• The elimination of mother-to-child transmission has become the focus of Rwanda’s ministry of health for reducing the rate of HIV.
• The states in India have been directed by the central government to provide free healthcare to pregnant women and sick neonatal children effective June 1.
• The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria has frozen payments on hundreds of millions of dollars worth of disease-fighting grants to China, one of the charity’s biggest recipients, in a dispute over China’s management of the grants and its hostility toward involving grass-roots organizations in public health issues.
• Government think-tanks in China and India have recommended a jointly funded initiative to strengthen traditional medicine innovations in both countries.

PROGRAMS

• In Ghana, the Oxytocin Initiative Project has begun testing whether community health workers can safely and effectively prevent postpartum hemorrhage.
• ‘Tupange’ is the name of a new outreach program in Kenya that hopes to increase and sustain contraceptive use among urban women.

RESEARCH

• Researchers discuss the new developments in vaccines for HIV/AIDS, malaria and TB in the scientific journal Nature.
• Vuvuzelas – the horns used by football fans celebrating last year’s World Cup – not only cause noise pollution but may also spread diseases, say experts. In crowded venues one person blowing a vuvuzela could infect many others with airborne illness like the flu or TB. Mercifully, organisers are considering whether to ban them at the 2012 London Olympics.
• Published by the Institute for Economics & Peace, the Global Peace Index tries to measure peace. This year has seen the world become less peaceful for the third year in a row – and highlights what it says is a continuing threat of terrorism.
• It may be against the law, but wealthier, better-educated families in India are choosing more and more often to abort pregnancies if the child is female, researchers in Canada and India report in the Lancet.
• Researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston find that diabetics have a higher risk of contracting TB.
• Lancet once called it “potentially the most important medical advance of the 20th century.” But today, oral rehydration therapy (ORT) — a simple treatment often consisting of a home solution of sugar, salt and water — is under-used, causing untold deaths of children.

DISEASES AND DISASTERS

• Due to lack of adequate vaccinations worldwide, measles has exploded this year. Infectious disease doesn’t respect borders and many American parents opt out getting their kids vaccinated.
• Zimbabwe has recently experienced a sharp rise in tuberculosis cases, leaving the politically unstable nation ranked 17th out of the 22 countries with highest TB outbreaks in the world.

TOTALLY UNRELATED TO ANYTHING ELSE: Apparently, to Nigerians, Bill and Melinda Gates do not look like rich people.

Global Health News Last Week

SECTION NEWS

APHA’s 2011 Section elections are coming up soon! Online voting will open on May 16 and ends on June 20. Section members should receive an e-mail on May 16 (next Monday) which will include:

• Your online election validation number
• Your APHA membership ID number
• Voting instructions
• A direct link to your voting Web site

All you have to do is click on the direct link and VOTE!

APHA’s Trade and Health Forum has released its first newsletter! The Forum has established a quarterly APHA Trade & Health Forum Newsletter that includes brief reports from forum members regarding recent work and analyses of issues related to trade and health, as well as announcements for trade and health advocacy opportunities and events. The first spring issue can be viewed here (PDF).

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David Sencer, the longest-serving director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and one of the leaders of the U.S. contribution to the smallpox campaign, passed away at age 86 on May 2.

May 5 was International Day of the Midwife.

POLICY

• The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the World Health Organization (WHO) have joined forces to assist Asia Pacific countries in identifying priority actions for dengue prevention and control.
• On May 11, dozens of countries around the world will kick off the first global Decade of Action for Road Safety, from 2011-2020.
• Starting last week, China’s Ministry of Health is strengthening its tobacco rules to require 28 types of businesses, including bars, coffee shops, hotels and stadiums to become 100 percent smoke-free.

PROGRAMS

• After a sensationalistic (and rather silly) report from the AP on corruption and graft, the Global Fund has assembled a high-level panel of independent experts to assess the risk of fraud in the current portfolio. The review should be concluded by mid-September
• Sri Lanka commemorated 100 years of its National Malaria Control Program, which has brought the death toll from malaria from 80,000 per year to 0, on May 5. In 2010, only 684 cases of malaria were reported in the country.
• Health officials in India have taken up a pilot project at taluka places to identify areas with less number of institutional deliveries to bring down maternal deaths.
• UNICEF has found that boreholes drilled in response to the Zimbabwe cholera outbreak in 2008 have not been adequately supported by the government in Harare.
• USAID announced that it will be launching a $10 million mobile health program which will deliver information and tips to mothers via SMS.

RESEARCH

• Protease inhibitors used to treat patients with HIV looks to provide an effective treatment to malaria as well and are being hailed as ‘superdrugs.’
• Headaches are the most common health disorders across the world, yet they remain neglected and under-treated, according to a UN study.
• Researchers warn that East African plants that could cure malaria could disappear before scientists have a chance to study them.

DISEASES AND DISASTERS

• India’s The Hindu provides a comprehensive article on the impact of TB in the country, and on women in particular.
• India achieved a major success on the global platform by pushing for inclusion of mental health in the list of non-communicable diseases.

Thanks, as usual, to the Healthy Dose and Humanosphere.

Global Health News Last Week

From March 28 to April 1, panelists working in Canada, Uganda, the United States, and Zambia will lead a discussion in GHDonline.org on ways to build sustainable partnerships to strengthen surgical and anesthesia capacity in resource-poor settings. More information can be found here.

March 22 was World Water Day. Blogger Tom Murphy has collected some interesting videos on PSI’s blog here.
Elizabeth Taylor, Hollywood icon and longtime advocate for the fight against HIV/AIDS, passed away on March 23 at age 78.
March 24 was World TB Day.

POLICY

• China, the world’s largest tobacco producer and home to a third of all smokers, has issued a national ban on smoking in hotels, restaurants and other indoor public spaces.
• Fears are growing among HIV/AIDS sufferers in the Ukraine amid claims from some patients that they have been denied life-saving medicines by authorities during a crackdown on drug substitution therapy.
• The WHO has announced a list of 30 essential medicines for treating common diseases of mothers and children that can be used as the basis for procurement and supply of medicines and guide local medicine production.

RESEARCH

• Scientists from the University of California, Berkeley (UCB), Dublin City University and Universidad de Valparaiso (Chile) have developed a self-powered, low-cost chip that can test blood samples and diagnose diseases like tuberculosis and HIV within minutes.
• Researchers have discovered that capsaicin, the compound that makes jalapeños, red chilies, and the famous habanero pepper spicy, inhibit the production of cholera toxins.
• Results from a recent study show that people with HIV who change antiretroviral treatment regimens due to side effects are at higher risk for developing drug resistance.
• The Pakistan Medical Association’s 2011 annual report found that 400,000 infants die in the first year of their life each year and 1 out of 10 children die by the age of five.
• A study by researchers from Johns Hopkins University found that child diarrhea deaths could be almost halved if currently available interventions such as breastfeeding, hand washing with soap, and improved household water treatment were widely implemented.
• Global health and development blogger Amanda Makulec shares seven key ideas that she took home from the Global Health Metrics and Evaluation Conference in Seattle.

DISEASES AND DISASTERS

• Despite setbacks, work continues at Japan’s Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant. Meanwhile, in addition to radiation-contaminated vegetables, officials are now warning families to not give Tokyo tap water to infants due to elevated levels of radiation found in the water supply. The World Bank estimates that the earthquake and tsunami have caused as much as $235 billion in damage to Japan and that it will take five years for the nation to recover.
• The crisis in Côte d’Ivoire continues as well, as the country’s healthcare system is strained by the violence.
• Leprosy, which has been officially “eliminated” in India, still affects hundreds of thousands of people who are shunned by society. There are 130,000 new cases diagnosed in the country each year.
• Leaders at the 26th Annual Conference of Alzheimer’s Disease International challenged the World Health Organization and countries around the world to take action on the dramatic surge in the global incidence of Alzheimer’s disease and dementia.

Global Health News Last Week

The 13th Triennial World Congress on Public Health, to be hosted by the Ethiopian Public Health Association and held from April 21-29, 2012 in Addis Ababa, will bring together leaders in health from across the globe. The conference, “Towards Global Health Equity: Opportunities and Threats,” is currently accepting abstracts; the deadline is Friday, October 21, at 12 a.m. PT (3 a.m. ET). More information can be found here.

International Women’s Day was March 8.

On March 11, a 9.0 earthquake rocked Japan’s Chiba prefecture, followed by a colossal tsunami that washed entire villages away.

The world, of course, stands ready to help, but it is unlikely that most of the assistance will be needed, as Japan is one of the most disaster-ready countries in the world. Unfortunately, the explosions in several of the country’s nuclear plants means that the threat of radiation poisoning looms heavily.

POLICY

• A panel of independent experts has released a report harshly criticizing the World Health Organization’s handling of the 2009 epidemic of H1N1 swine flu.
• UN officials expressed concern that rising food and energy prices could compromise or even reverse progress toward the MDGs in developing nations.
• UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has instructed senior managers to cut 3%, or US$5.4 billion, from budgets.
• The Kenyan government has moved to strip HIV/AIDS of its special status and begin treating it as a chronic medical condition. It has begun implementing a disease integration model that will do away with emergency response measures and dismantle parallel administrative structures set up to manage the disease.

RESEARCH

• HealthMap, a project that aggregates health and surveillance data from sounces such as the WHO, Google News, and Eurosurveillance, was launched recently to “[bring] together disparate data sources to achieve a unified and comprehensive view of the current global state of infectious diseases and their effect on human and animal health.”
• According to a study done by Tuberculosis Research Centre in India, alarming numbers of women with TB become homeless after they are diagnosed. Approximately 100,000 women are abandoned by their husbands due to TB every year in India.
• A group of researchers from EPFL’s Global Health Institute and Inserm (Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale, the French government agency for biomedical research) has discovered that a class of chemotherapy drugs also kills the parasite that causes malaria.

PROGRAMS

• Oxfam recently released a report criticizing the World Bank for its praise of Ghana’s healthcare system. Amanda Glassman of CGDev disagrees, arguing that Oxfam ignored surveys indicating the system’s success in improving health indicators and beneficiaries’ satisfaction with the quality of service.
• On March 9, Saving Lives At Birth, a global partnership between USAID, the Government of Norway, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Grand Challenges Canada, and the World Bank, was launched. The partnership “will seek innovative solutions to reduce maternal and newborn mortality in developing countries.”

DISEASES

• Rwanda is on track to completely eliminate malaria, the first country in its region.

Global Health News Last Week (plus interest in a new working group!)

Attention IH Section Members: Dr. Kaja Abbas, MPH student at the University of Rochester, is gauging interest in forming a working group focused on using system science to improve global health, similar to the intitiaves being promoted by NIH. Her interests are in conducting system science research on global health policy by modeling population and disease dynamics and economic evaluation of public health interventions and systems, with a focus on HIV and TB. Dr. Malcolm Bryant, our section chair, has encouraged the expansion of our section’s activities in areas of technical expertise, and Dr. Abbas is enthusiastic about a working group within the section that promotes system science methodologies for global health solutions. She welcomes your thoughts and suggestions at kaja [dot] abbas [at] gmail [dot] com.

Global Health Delivery online’s HIV prevention community is hosting a “virtual expert panel” March 7-11 to continue the dialogue around PrEP as a novel approach to prevention. Panelists from Uganda, South Africa and the United States will lead the online discussion, highlighting various barriers and opportunities to implementing PrEP in clinical settings; how to encourage long-term adherence; and what additional research questions need to be answered. Panelists include (1) Douglas Krakower, MD, a fellow in Infectious Diseases at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center/Harvard Medical School, (2)Andrew Mujugira, MBChB, MSc, the East Africa regional medical director for the Partners PrEP study, and (3) Vivek Naranbhai, PhD, who was involved in CAPRISA microbicide gel study. All GHDonline members can participate in this online discussion. You can sign up here if you are not currently a member.

POLICY

• Paramount Chief Mpezeni of the Ngoni people in the Eastern Province of Zambia has urged his subjects to get circumcised in order to reduce the chances of spreading HIV/AIDS and other communicable diseases in his land.
• Britain is threatening to pull out of the Food and Agriculture Organization due to “patchy” performance.
• Due to uncertainty in past estimates, the Indian government has formed a 16-member expert group to determine the annual death rate caused by malaria in the country each year.
• The breakdown of the air conditioning in the plenary hall of the Philippines’ House of Representatives stalled the heated debate of a controversial reproductive health bill. The bill is vehemently opposed by the Catholic Church and pro-life groups and has caused a stir in the largely Catholic country.
• A massive demonstration rally was held in New Delhi to protest a free trade agreement between India and Europe, which many fear may threaten the production of low-cost generic drugs, particularly HIV medicines.

RESEARCH

• US researchers believe that half of men in the general population may be infected with human papillomavirus or HPV, the human wart virus that causes cervical and other cancers, strengthening the case for vaccinating boys against HPV.
• A recent study published in the WHO bulletin argues for the need to implement gender-specific tobacco control activites to curb the growing tobacco epidemic.
• The World Economic Forum in Geneva, Switzerland, announced the launch of the Global Health Data Charter, a project designed to improve global health by leveraging the collection and management of data.
• A new study by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation found that the poorest in Thailand have significantly more difficulty accessing diabetes care than the general population.
• A research trial found that a microbicide gel with the ARV tenofovir, initially designed for vaginal use, may also be effective in stopping HIV transmission during anal sex.
• A report released by UNICEF, “The State of the World’s Children 2011,” highlighted India’s poor child and maternal health conditions.

PROGRAMS

• Dr. Bruce Aylward, head of the WHO’s Global Polio Eradication Initiative, discusses why it is so difficult to eradicate polio. Meanwhile, former US President Jimmy Carter is leading his own campaign to make guinea worm the second disease (after smallpox) to be eradicated.
• Amanda Glassman writes about Bangladesh’s success story in drastically lowering its maternal mortality rate.
• The International HIV/AIDS Alliance is expanding its project (which is funded by the UK’s Department for International Development) to reduce HIV-related maternal mortality in South Sudan.
• Prompted by Burma’s (Myanmar’s) transition to “civilian rule” after last November’s elections, the Global Fund has returned and is providing grants for HIV/AIDS, malaria, and TB programs.

DISEASES

• The WHO has declared Nepal polio-free after no infections were reported during a six-month period, while a new outbreak is spiking in the DRC.
• The massive flow of refugees fleeing violence in Libya has created a humanitarian crisis, as organizations struggle to provide for the basic needs of nearly 175,000 people who have crossed the border into Tunisia, Egypt, and Niger.
• After losing 4,500 lives to the cholera epidemic that raged through Haiti after the January 2009 earthquake, doctors in Port-au-Prince say they are bringing the disease under control. Unfortunately, health experts fear that the rainy season will cause a fresh outbreak in Nigeria.

Global Health News Last Week

POLICY

• Amanda Glassman discusses the debate surrounding a new proposal by the United Network for Organ Sharing to prioritize younger, healthier donors for kidney transplants instead of their current “first come, first served” approach.
• The highly-anticipated new UN agency, UN Women was launched on Thursday. It will be headed by former Chilean President, Michelle Bachelet. Women’s rights advocates argue that domestic violence should be the agency’s top priority.

RESEARCH

• A paper published in Science by a research group at the University of Maryland demonstrates that a fungus, Metarhizium anisopliae, can be used to combat the malarial parasite inside the mosquito. Another promising study suggests that a compound produced by a seaweed in Fiji could be used to combat malaria.
• A new study has shown that that Internet kiosks providing information on prenatal and postnatal care have helped reduce infant, child, and maternal mortality rates in rural India.
• A study published by the Harvard School of Public Health last year found that the poorest third of the world’s population account for only 4% of surgeries worldwide, and that over two million people in low-income countries have no access to life-saving surgery.
• The first phase trials of the HIV vaccine developed in India were completed with no side effects reported. Meanwhile, a three-year research trial on a vaginal anti-HIV gel has been launched in Rwanda.
• The Trachoma Atlas, an open-access resource on the geographical distribution of trachoma, was launched by a team of collaborators from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, the International Trachoma Initiative at The Task Force for Global Health, and the Carter Center. It is funded by a generous donation from (you guessed it!) the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
• The European Solutions Enterprise for Neglected Diseases (euSEND), a new initiative, based in the Netherlands, was launched to aid in the fight against neglected tropical diseases. The organization’s goal is to “take the role of matchmaker” to facilitate partnerships in research for NTD treatments and vaccines.

PROGRAMS

• Swaziland has a large-scale circumcision drive in an attempt to lower HIV rates.
• Cash-transfer programs as a means of assisting the poor are beginning to gain attention and popularity from development and economic professionals. Mexico’s and Brazil’s have captured particular attention and are credited with poverty reduction and GDP growth.
• The first methadone maintenance program in sub-Saharan Africa recently opened in a hospital in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Heroin use is a growing problem in port cities, where the drug passes through en route from Afghanistan to Europe.

DISEASES

• WHO Director-General Margaret Chan and IAEA Director-General Yukiya Amano published a joint editorial on the growing burden of cancer on the world’s poor and disadvantaged populations.
• H5N1, colloquially known as bird flu, is making a comeback: a report of a Cambodian mother and her infant dying after eating meat from a contaminated chicken is the latest in a series of cases in Indonesia, South Korea, and India.
• here has been an increase in reported cholera cases in three regions in Ghana, where 34 deaths have occurred over the last five months. In Haiti, the WHO has warned of a high risk of cholera during Carnival in the absence of strict hygiene measures.

Drug Wars: What does a free trade agreement between India and the EU mean for generics?

When I was a junior in college, I had to give a presentation for my honors Molecular Genetics class. The hot topics that year were avian influenza and HIV. I had just been accepted into the School of Rural Public Health’s MPH program, so I decided to get in the HIV-line, but with a twist: rather than present a paper on the mechanism of infection or a mutant viral protein, I would pull the lens back and look at the disease from a public health standpoint. It was an eye-opener for a lot of my classmates, most of whom were biochemistry majors whose only exposure to HIV had been through pictures of Western blots in peer-reviewed journal articles. Some of the strongest reactions were to cost of care, especially drug prices: when I cited several drugs that entered the market at $25 (darunavir), $29 (tipranavir), or even $61 (efuvirtide) for one day’s dose in the U.S., eyes widened and jaws dropped across the room.

Flickr, doug88888

The war on drug prices is a long-standing, bitter battle between the pharmaceutical industry and humanitarian groups and lobbyists, with governments and regulators perpetually caught in the middle. International health and humanitarian organizations argue that access to inexpensive medicines is vital to the survival of the poor who need them, and that Big Pharma is driven by greed and cares only for its profit margins. Pharmaceutical companies counter that intellectual property protection and patents encourage innovation and the development of newer and better drugs. The solution to this dilemma in developing countries, including India and many African nations, has been generics. India’s patent laws make it easy for regulators to deny drug patent applications, allowing Indian pharmaceutical companies to use the data from clinical trials already performed to get approval to produce cheap generic versions of patented medications. India is the world’s leading producer of inexpensive generic drugs – its pharmaceutical industry makes most of its money by producing generic versions of drugs patented by Western companies – which has earned its reputation as “the pharmacy of the developing world.” India supplies 80% of the medicines distributed by medical humanitarian organizations in poor countries; in particular, 93% of ARVs going to HIV patients in these countries are Indian-made.

The EU is currently negotiating a free-trade deal that may change all of this: in addition to agricultural tariffs and work visa agreements, Europe is trying to negotiate a period of exclusive access to pharmaceutical companies’ research and clinical trial data. No specific amount of time has been finalized, but without information from the clinical trials already conducted, generics manufacturers would have to conduct their own testing to register their products. Opponents of this provision fear that this will drive up the cost of generic medicines and make them unaffordable for the poor. Médicins sans Frontières (Doctors without Borders) has launched their “Europe! HANDS OFF our Medicine” campaign specifically against this component of the agreement. The WHO and the UN’s special rapporteur on the Right to Health Anand Grover are also concerned, and the Indian generic pharmaceutical industry is predicting a global health crisis if the trade agreements lead to production restrictions. The European Commission insists that the negotiations will not negatively impact India’s generics industry, but worries will persist until a draft of the agreement is released.

The ever-continuing debate underscores the need to find a balance between encouraging economic growth and innovation, and ensuring affordable access to medicines for those who need them. Though the start-to-finish cost of producing drugs can admittedly cost billions of dollars, the question of whether it justifies such high new value benchmarks has not yet been settled. The fact that so many millions wait in line for these drugs begs this ever-persistent question: what is the point of charging so much for drugs that so many need if so few can afford them?

Global Health News This Week

November 22 was Public Health Thank-You Day, and November 25 marked the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

UNAIDS released a report that said that we are finally making significant progress against the global HIV/AIDS epidemic. In related news, an international trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that daily prophylaxis can prevent HIV infection in MSM.

The Bread for the World Institute released its 2011 Hunger Report, which says that global hunger is increasing as the global food crisis gets worse.

A study published in the Lancet found that the malaria death toll in India may be as much as 13 times higher than WHO estimates.

Another study published in the journal Vaccine estimated that global polio eradication could save the world $50 billion.

The strain responsible for the cholera outbreak in Haiti has been identified as one originating from southeast Asia, which has led many Haitians to blame the Nepalese UN peacekeepers and has sparked riots against the UN.

Pushing for Polio Eradication: Does a Vertical Approach Make Sense in a Horizontal World?

The global polio eradication effort suffered an unexpected setback this year.  An outbreak began in February in Tajikistan, which had not seen a case of polio in 19 years, and 452 cases have been confirmed as of August 5.¹  From there, it has migrated to Russia, where it has infected seven individuals.^1,2  Russia’s last confirmed case of polio was in 1996.  This outbreak is a discouraging reality check for a two-decade eradication effort that hovers on the edge of success but cannot quite seem to reach it.

Image taken from the 2009 Annual Letter from Bill Gates. Available at: http://www.gatesfoundation.org/annual-letter/Pages/2009-polio-eradication.aspx

After the successful eradication of smallpox in 1979, global health organizations have pushed a similar “vertical” approach to eradicate other disease.³  The polio eradication campaign, which began in 1988, has been aggressively carried out with a similar mindset and has been largely successful.  Incidence has been reduced by over 99%, with less than 1,000 cases reported in the year 2000 compared to 350,000 in 1988.  In Africa, ten of the 15 previously polio countries re-infected in 2009 successfully halted their outbreaks.⁴  It is currently only endemic in Nigeria, India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan.^2,4  For the last ten years, however, the initiative has “hovered on the verge of victory” without being able to reach it.⁵  There were 1,604 cases in 2009, and 576 cases have been confirmed globally so far this year.²  The effort has cost approximated $8.2 to date.³ 

The long-standing fight against polio has raised an interesting discussion about this and similar approaches to public health: are singularly-focused health efforts such as disease eradication the best way to work toward health improvement?  Large scale donors, such as the Gates Foundation and Rotary, typically prefer these “vertical” strategies because the benefits seem clearer and more immediate; “horizontal” strategies, on the other hand, such as strengthening health systems, training workers, and increasing supplies, have less well-defined goals, and long-term change is much more difficult to measure.³  The ongoing struggle for polio eradication has re-energized this debate.  Global health stakeholders responded in June with a new Strategic Plan, which builds on findings from a recent independent evaluation of the eradication effort and proposes a combined approach of  area-specific strategies to target remaining reservoirs of polio and targeting health system weaknesses.⁴  This plan will hopefully inspire organizations working in the effort to make the final push toward wiping out polio for good.  When the plan was unveiled in Geneva, however, Dr. Margaret Chan of WHO called on the international funding community “stand tall for polio eradication,” reminding us that the effort can still falter in the face of economic crisis if funding lapses.  It will be interesting to see how much longer smallpox will stand alone on the list of eradicated diseases.