According to this paper, the world is off track in meeting the Millennium Development Health Goals. It urges world leaders and other stakeholders to accelerate progress to reach the goals set to improve maternal and child health. It calls for rapid expansion of antiretroviral coverage for women with HIV in order to reduce maternal mortality, rapid expansion of antiretroviral treatment for all men and women with HIV, the integration of services to prevent HIV transmission to infants and to achieve rapid paediatric HIV diagnosis across all sexual and reproductive health services and all services for newborns. Governments are urged to provide support to implement the most effective antiretroviral regimens to prevent HIV transmission to infants and scale up efforts to diagnose HIV in children, expand ART for children and the paper argues that expanded funding for the Global Fund is required to bring it in line with its most ambitious scenario of USD$20 billion for the next three years.
Equity in Health
Over 1.2 billion adolescents - one person in five - are making the transition from childhood to adulthood. How well they are prepared to face adult challenges in a fast changing world will shape humanity's common future. Adolescents must be enabled to avoid early pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections and HIV/AIDS while being given skills, opportunities and a real say in development plans, stresses The State of World Population 2003 report by UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund.
Several misunderstandings have arisen about the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The biggest is that every country must achieve the same numerical targets (for example, halve poverty by 2015), which is incorrect because global performance is an average of all countries’ performance, so some countries will perform above and below average in order to achieve them. A one-size-fits-all approach will not work, as different countries have followed different approaches and strategies for achieving social and economic progress, with varying costs. Unless disparities within countries are addressed, the MDGs will not be met by 2015. To formulate a homegrown MDG-based national development strategy to address inequality and to achieve the MDGs, the author proposes four practical steps: tailor the global targets to make them context-sensitive, set intermediate targets for political accountability, translate targets into specific programmes and policies, and cost programmatic and policy interventions.
Considerable declines in malaria have accompanied increased funding for control since the year 2000, but historical failures to maintain gains against the disease underscore the fragility of these successes. In this study, researchers conducted a systematic review of the literature to identify historical malaria resurgence events. They identified 75 resurgence events in 61 countries, occurring from the 1930s through the 2000s. Almost all resurgence events (91%) were attributed at least in part to the weakening of malaria control programmes for a variety of reasons, of which resource constraints were the most common (57%). Over half of the events (59%) were attributed in part to increases in the intrinsic potential for malaria transmission, while only 32% were attributed to vector or drug resistance. Given that most malaria resurgences have been linked to weakening of control programmes, this study highlights the need to develop practical solutions to the financial and operational threats to effectively sustaining today's successful malaria control programmes.
A record number of people have died in Namibia so far this year from malaria, the government announced Friday, with the number of deaths up 70 percent from last year.
MHEN held a National Forum on 22nd and 23rd November 2007 at Lilongwe Hotel. It brought together a network of policy makers and practitioners who work in the field of health services delivery. The forum explored the challenges in health services delivery in a non-industrialised country with limited resources.
This paper, from the Health Systems Trust, is an analysis of the clinical, health systems and underlying reasons for the drastic deterioration in maternal health in Malawi. It finds that the high maternal mortality rates are a result of poor health care, health systems deficiencies, limited access to care and harmful ‘patient-related behaviour.’ The paper argues that there are three ways of improving maternal health: through an integrated health systems approach, through improvements within maternal health programmes, and by equitably addressing poverty and social inequalities.
HIV/AIDS education and prevention campaigns often ignore prisoners but a project in Malawi is reaching out to educate them about the disease and treat those with sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Malawi prisons are considered fertile grounds for transmission of HIV/AIDS and yet little has been done to prevent the spread of the virus or treat patients already infected, Walker Jiyani, programme director for the Health in Prisons (HIP) project, told PlusNews.
The government of President Bingu wa Mutharika has made strides in improving Malawi's health care system. IRIN spoke to World Health Organisation (WHO) representative Matshidiso Moeti about the remaining challenges.
QUESTION: What is your general impression of the health system in Malawi?
ANSWER: The health system in Malawi is in a very dynamic process of improvement right now. But I know there are a number of challenges: these ... include shortage of staff, and there is need to recruit more to meet these challenges; the other challenge facing the health system is the supply and management of drugs.
* Click on the link for the full interview.
Slowing the spread of HIV/AIDS in Malawi and preventing the nation's already high maternal mortality rate from climbing must be addressed as an integral part of the humanitarian response to Southern Africa's famine, the U.N. Population Fund have warned. Widespread hunger and a related cholera epidemic have caused maternal death rates to rise sharply this year.