The War on Drugs has failed, a blue-ribbon panel of experts has concluded, and has actually made things worse.
September 26, 2014
September 23, 2014
A 2010 study found that the screening and treatment of infected mothers (thus preventing mother-to-child transmission of syphilis) is “among the most cost-effective public health interventions in existence.”
September 17, 2014
As global leaders repeatedly fail to reach agreements on setting emissions targets to slow the rate of global warming, local communities are taking action to protect themselves from a leading driver of climate change: the burning of fossil fuels.
September 10, 2014
In the US and globally, ALS certainly claims fewer lives each year than more common diseases. Cancer, for example, caused 204 deaths per 100,000 in the US in 2010. At the same time, these more common diseases generally have much better treatment options and longer-term prognoses – and many of them can even be prevented.
September 4, 2014
In the countries most affected by the outbreak, family members of victims have become outcasts out of fear that they will transmit the virus. Panic about the virus is spreading globally.
Since 2009, the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) has published annual reports tracking development assistance for health (DAH), striving to improve the methods by which we collectively quantify the amount of money that development partners, governments, and other organizations spend to improve health worldwide.
September 3, 2014
The myriad of challenges contributing to the persisting spread of Ebola in West Africa – the biggest Ebola outbreak since the viral haemorrhagic fever was discovered in 1976 – echo some of the biggest obstacles which continue to challenge the global efforts to eradicate polio.
August 25, 2014
Here, we take a deeper dive into Zambia’s health landscape, and how the country has improved its delivery of health interventions.
August 22, 2014
But when it comes to the health situation in Israel and Palestine, the lopsided death tolls during periods of conflict are only the tip of the iceberg.
August 18, 2014
Studies have shown that, done right, public discussion of celebrity suicides can help educate people and prevent those at risk from taking their own lives. What will be surprising to many is that, worldwide, more years of life are lost as a result of suicide than
August 11, 2014
Eastern and Southern sub-Saharan Africa accounted for 55% of total deaths from HIV/AIDS in 2013. In most countries in these regions, deaths from the disease are dropping. Such progress, however, must be considered along with countries where death rates have stagnated or even increased.
August 1, 2014
Despite this progress, major challenges remain: there were an estimated 11.9 million cases of tuberculosis (TB) worldwide in 2013, including those individuals with HIV (11.2 million excluding those with HIV); more effective vaccines against the disease are badly needed; and multidrug resistant TB is a growing threat.
July 31, 2014
An AIDS fable: Once upon a time, in the years after AIDS went from being a death sentence to a manageable disease, at least for people rich enough to take antiretroviral therapy, many of the people who ran the world believed that these medicines weren’t appropriate for residents of very poor countries. Even leaving aside the cost, they thought that poor people couldn’t take their medicines on time. Andrew Natsios, the head of the United States Agency for International Development in the George W. Bush administration, argued against funding antiretroviral therapy in Africa. “People do not know what watches and clocks are,” he told the Boston Globe in June, 2001.
July 24, 2014
Death rates for people with HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria all have decreased globally since the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) were established in 2000, according to a report published Monday as part of the Global Burden of Disease (GBD).
July 21, 2014
The world has seen tremendous progress in the fight against HIV/AIDS over the last decade, documenting huge advances in treatment effectiveness, access to affordable drugs, and ways to prevent further transmission of the deadly virus.
July 11, 2014
As it turns out, Costa Rica has been scoring big on and off the soccer pitch – especially for child health. Between 1990 and 2010, the small Central American country documented a 48% decline in rates of premature mortality from preterm birth complications and a 53% decrease from neonatal encephalopathy.
July 10, 2014
Child mortality is widely recognized as an indicator of a community’s overall health, with reductions in child deaths often cited as evidence of the impact of a particular intervention.
June 24, 2014
While soccer fans globally have been following the excitement of the World Cup matches in Brazil, riots in the country have thrust its poverty and inequality into the international spotlight. While Brazil has made progress in reducing poverty and improving health, much work remains to improve well-being in the country.
June 13, 2014
While mass shootings attract a great deal of attention from the media here in America, is the problem overblown? The evidence suggests it is not. Gun violence is a leading cause of death among young men in the U.S.
June 5, 2014
It turns out that sexual violence is mostly perpetrated by people known to the victim – not strangers.
May 30, 2014
The global health community cannot afford to ignore the problem of obesity and overweight. Globally, it killed 3.4 million people in 2010 alone. According to new findings published as part of the Global Burden of Disease Study 2013, more and more people in developing countries are joining the ranks of the world’s obese, especially women.
May 23, 2014
In order to solve a health problem, it may sound a bit obvious to say you first need to know what it is. A diagnosis. What may not be so obvious is that one of the biggest, and perhaps less appreciated challenges, in global health today is the lack of complete, accurate and comparable health data.
May 16, 2014
In sub-Saharan Africa, the burden of schistosomiasis – a disease caused by water-borne parasitic worms – disproportionately affects females. What’s more, it may explain why women uniquely account for a greater percentage of people living with HIV/AIDS in Africa.
April 25, 2014
It’s well known that malaria is a major killer of children in sub-Saharan Africa, but it also causes substantial suffering, especially among children and the elderly.
April 18, 2014
Visualizing the different ways that alcohol impacts people’s health across regions also highlights how data can help policymakers choose approaches for combatting harmful alcohol use that make the most sense for their region. These approaches range from enforcement of drunk driving laws to alcohol taxes and programs to screen and treat alcoholics and discourage binge drinking.