Global public health
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Global public health · Jan 2011
UN resolution on the prevention and control of non-communicable diseases: an opportunity for global action.
In May 2010, the United Nations (UN) General Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution on non-communicable diseases (NCDs) that called for high-level meetings to address the global burden of NCDs. This paper highlights the growing global burden of NCDs (cardiovascular diseases, cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases and diabetes), provides a brief historical background on the adoption of the UN NCDs resolution and argues that the resolution provides a remarkable new opportunity for improved international collaboration to address NCDs. Additionally, the paper argues that while the existing World Health Organisation programme on NCDs be continued and expanded, the UN can provide the expanded political leadership that is necessary for multi-sectoral collaboration and can serve as a respected forum for dealing with the issue across numerous key UN agencies.
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Global public health · Jan 2011
Human rights violations during Israel's attack on the Gaza Strip: 27 December 2008 to 19 January 2009.
The Israeli attack on the Gaza Strip from 27 December 2008 to 19 January 2009 was characterised by gross, unprecedented human rights violations, which were the result of a deliberate political decision to overlook the loss of civilian lives in order to save those of Israeli soldiers. These violations included attacking medical personnel and civilians, impeding emergency medical evacuations, restricting health care for the civilian population, preventing referral to care outside the Gaza Strip and jeopardising distribution of medical supplies and food. ⋯ It will emphasise how the Palestinian medical system has been stretched to its breaking point, severely and negatively affecting the provision of medical services; the consequences of denying patients referral to care outside the Gaza Strip; and other severe violations of human rights. It will conclude by reiterating that only the withdrawal of Israeli occupation from Palestinian land can guarantee the right to health of Palestinians.
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Global public health · Jan 2011
Collecting injury surveillance data in low- and middle-income countries: the Cape Town Trauma Registry pilot.
Injury is a major public health issue, responsible for 5 million deaths each year, equivalent to the total mortality caused by HIV, malaria and tuberculosis combined. The World Health Organisation estimates that of the total worldwide deaths due to injury, more than 90% occur in low- and middle-income countries (LMIC). Despite the burden of injury sustained by LMIC, there are few continuing injury surveillance systems for collection and analysis of injury data. ⋯ A pilot at Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town was conducted for one month to demonstrate the feasibility of systematic data collection and analysis, and to explore challenges of implementing a trauma registry in a LMIC. Key characteristics of the CTTR include: ability to calculate injury severity, key minimal data elements, expansion to include quality indicators and minimal drain on human resources based on few fields. The CTTR provides a strategy to describe the distribution and consequences of injury in a high trauma volume, low-resource environment.
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Global public health · Jan 2011
Access to medicines and domestic compulsory licensing: learning from Canada and Thailand.
Within the array of measures for improving medicines access for the world's neediest populations, governments of many countries have turned to compulsory licensing, a statutory mechanism to enable third parties to manufacture a product or process still under patent. In this paper, we focus on a historic case example from Canada and the present example of Thailand's use of domestic compulsory licenses as a policy tool for ensuring public access to affordable medicines. The overarching objective is to draw out policy and legislative insights that may be of value for countries with pharmaceutical manufacturing capacity and which are considering better access to patented medicines for their populations under the current global intellectual property regime. From these cases, it is apparent that although compulsory licensing is not a novel remedy, even in a post-Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights environment, it remains a powerful policy tool in improving access to medicines in a variety of domestic settings.