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World Medical Association adopts climate change, task shifting resolutions

At its general assembly in New Delhi, India, the World Medical Association (WMA), "a conglomerate of medical associations around the world," approved a plan that aims "to minimise the risk of increased malnutrition deaths, diseases and injuries due to climate change," IANS/Thaindian News reports (10/17).

20 Oct 2009

Health officials spray Indonesian city to prevent diseases; news outlets examine other natural disasters

News outlets explored the health implications of natural disasters in Indonesia, the Philippines, Tonga, Samoa and India:

7 Oct 2009

Also in global health news: Drought in East Africa; improving food processing in Africa; Hajj pilgrims must take polio vaccine; fighting insecticide-resistant mosquitoes

"A severe and persistent five-year drought" is pushing "[m]ore than 23 million people ... towards severe hunger and destitution across East Africa, international aid agency Oxfam has warned as it launches a £9.5 million [about $15 million] emergency appeal," the U.K. Press Association reports (9/29). According to Reuters/New York Times, "Malnutrition is now above emergency levels in some areas and hundreds of thousands of valuable cattle are dying" (Wallis, 9/29).

30 Sep 2009

Satellite imaging used to predict outbreaks of infectious disease

Scientists in the USA have established a way to predict outbreaks of cholera, making it easier to control. This finding could provide a model to predict and potentially control outbreaks of other important infectious diseases.

2 Sep 2008

WHO says inequities around the world are killing people on a "grand scale"

According to a report by the World Health Organization (WHO) inequities around the world are responsible for killing people on a "grand scale".

1 Sep 2008

Social injustice is killing people on a grand scale reports WHO's Commission

A child born in a Glasgow, Scotland suburb can expect a life 28 years shorter than another living only 13 kilometres away. A girl in Lesotho is likely to live 42 years less than another in Japan. In Sweden, the risk of a woman dying during pregnancy and childbirth is 1 in 17 400; in Afghanistan, the odds are 1 in 8. Biology does not explain any of this. Instead, the differences between - and within - countries result from the social environment where people are born, live, grow, work and age.

28 Aug 2008

Leptospira licerasiae, a new species of infectious disease found in Amazon

While investigating the tropical disease leptospirosis in the Peruvian Amazon, an infectious disease specialist from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine has uncovered new, emerging bacteria that may be responsible for up to 40 percent of cases of the disease.

3 Apr 2008

WHO says earthquake survivors need medical care, safe water, vaccinations

The World Health Organization is sending emergency equipment, and will help to support vaccination campaigns and set up a disease surveillance system following the devastating earthquake on the island of Java, Indonesia on Saturday.

29 May 2006

Fifty more deaths in Angola from cholera

According to the World Health Organization (WHO) another 50 people have died from cholera in Angola in the last week.

14 May 2006

Third nationwide polio drive in Indonesia in attempt to eliminate the disease

Indonesia which is still battling to eliminate the recurring outbreak of polio, will hold a third nationwide polio immunisation drive in November to try to finally stamp out the crippling disease.

19 Oct 2005

Health officials insist they were prepared for Katrina

Federal health officials in the U.S. are defending themselves against criticism that the government was not prepared to deal with disaster left by Hurricane Katrina.

7 Sep 2005

Concern about the environment grows in East Asia as impacts of pollution and urbanization increase

Pollution and environmental degradation increasingly threaten the health of East Asia and Pacific's rapidly urbanizing population, according to two new environment reports from the World Bank.

19 Apr 2005

Food safety regulators meet in global effort to reduce the more than 2 billion cases of foodborne illness

Faced with an increasing global burden of foodborne disease, more than 300 food safety regulators from over 100 countries will gather for the 2nd Global Forum of Food Safety Regulators from 12 to 14 October.

12 Oct 2004

Plea for every human to have access to safe drinking water

A plea to the world's physicians and health authorities to do more to support measures to provide access to safe drinking water at low cost to every human on the planet has been made by the World Medical Association.

12 Oct 2004

New recommendations which will help pre-empt drinking water contamination

Ensuring drinking water is safe is a challenge in every part of the world, from water piped into people's homes, to rural wells and water provided to refugee camps in an emergency.

22 Sep 2004

Foodborne diseases pose a serious threat to densely populated areas of Asia and the Pacific

Foodborne diseases pose a serious threat to densely populated areas of Asia and the Pacific, two UN agencies said today. ''So far, food contamination incidents and food-borne disease outbreaks in the region have been relatively isolated, but the potential danger is just round the corner.

25 May 2004