WHO – Maternal Deaths Fall

NAIROBI, Sep 15 2010 (IPS) – The number of women dying from pregnancy related causes around the world is falling. Sub-Saharan Africa remains one of the most dangerous place for pregnant women, despite recording a 26 percent reduction in maternal mortality rates.
Government hospital in Makeni, Sierra Leone: reaching women in rrual areas and poor households is key to continued progress. Credit: Nancy Paulus/IRIN

Government hospital in Makeni, Sierra Leone: reaching women in rrual areas and poor households is key to continued progre…

RWANDA: Stronger Support for Children Affected by HIV

Aimable Twahirwa

KIGALI, Nov 8 2010 (IPS) – At Kigali s Kibagabaga Hospital, 30 young people aged between 12 and 18 years old wait in a crowded holding room, waiting for their turn to see the doctor in charge of prescribing antiretroviral drugs (ARVs). They are among 220,000 children affected by AIDS who are benefiting from social and medical assistance from the Rwandan government and its development partners.
Rwanda is seeking to expand support available to children affected by HIV, like these orphans in Muhanga village. Credit: Aimable Twahirwa/IPS

HAITI: Envoys and Poll Officials Try to Defuse Tensions

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Dec 13 2010 (IPS) – After almost a week of violent protests over preliminary elections results that left at least five dead, Haiti awoke to an eerie and tense calm Monday after a well-coordinated trial balloon was launched late Sunday night.
Men on a motorbike pass a burning campaign poster on Dec. 8, 2010. Credit: Digital.Democracy/flickr

Men on a motorbike pass a burning campaign poster on Dec. 8, 2010. Credit: Digital.Democracy/flickr

After a rumour-filled weekend, the Provisional Electoral Council (CEP) announced that a special commission was recou…

HEALTH: Battle Against Dengue Finds a New Front

Stephen de Tarczynski

MELBOURNE, Jan 26 2011 (IPS) – When an outbreak of dengue fever occurred in the hot and humid north of Australia s Queensland state in late 2008, Nicola Strange was among hundreds of locals that contracted the mosquito-borne disease.
Now, together with her husband, Nicola Strange is volunteering their property for use in a scientific field trial that researchers hope will be the next step in an ambitious plan to eradicate dengue fever, an infection that leads to thousands of deaths in tropical areas of the world every year.

I ve never felt so unwell, says Nicola, recalling her experience of type- two dengue.

Her fever lasted for a good week , with a high temperature accompanied by an intense headache, vomiting and severe pain behind her …

Combating Poverty With ‘Poor Economics’

PARIS, Mar 31 2011 (IPS) – French economist Esther Duflo thinks poverty can be alleviated or even eradicated with the right policies. All it takes is for politicians to translate research into action, implementing programmes that have been shown to work.
French economist Esther Duflo Credit: A. D. McKenzie/IPS

French economist Esther Duflo Credit: A. D. McKenzie/IPS

But that is easier said than done. Duflo, who last year won the American Economic Association s prestigious John Bates Clark Medal, acknowledges that it is sometimes frustrating to get policy makers to apply the results of research that could impro…

PAKISTAN: Vaccinators Get a Shot in the Arm

Zofeen Ebrahim

KARACHI, Apr 28 2011 (IPS) – The questions came like something from a medical student s exam: What is routine immunisation? When should a vaccine be destroyed? What is the best temperature for storing a vaccine? At which angle should the needle be held while administering a pentavalent vaccine? And which five diseases does a pentavalent vaccine prevent?
All these and hundreds more were thrown at a group of vaccinators at a three-day training held by the government-run Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI). It was part of a nationwide exercise to improve the skills of the country s army of vaccinators full-time employees of the Health Ministry whose job is to make sure Pakistan s 15 million children below five years old are inoculated against disease.

HIV Infections Down, but Treatment Access Still Uneven

Elizabeth Whitman

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 3 2011 (IPS) – Officials underscored the importance of stepped-up action Friday to combat HIV/AIDS, the worst epidemic the world has seen since it began 30 years ago, ahead of a high-level meeting on the disease at the United Nations next week.
Although greater numbers of people have gained access to treatment and rates of new infections have dropped, declining by 25 percent globally from 2001 to 2009, We still have a long way to go, said Asha-Rose Migiro, deputy U.N. secretary-general, in a press briefing to launch the report .

At the end of 2010, for instance, about 6.6 million people in low and middle-income countries were receiving antiretroviral therapy. Yet 9.0 million eligible people in those same countries were not receiv…

SOMALIA: “Children on the Verge of Death Left Behind to Save Those Who Had a Chance”

Abdurrahman Warsameh

MOGADISHU, Jul 20 2011 (IPS) – Tens of thousands of starving Somalis have made their way to the government- held part of Mogadishu in search of food, but many parents have made the anguished decision to leave a child too weak to make the journey behind in hope of saving the others.
One of the millions of children in Somalia in need of food aid. Credit: Abdurrahman Warsameh/IPS

One of the millions of children in Somalia in need of food aid. Credit: Abdurrahman Warsameh/IPS

As many from the south abandon their homes and make their way to the city s c…

CONGO: Many Indigenous Women Still Give Birth in the Forest

Arsène Séverin

BRAZZAVILLE, Aug 24 2011 (IPS) – Marguerite Kassa feared she would find herself alone in the small crowd of a dozen other pregnant women at the integrated health centre in Mossendjo, in the southwestern Republic of Congo. I am six months pregnant already, but I hesitated to come here before now, because there is so much contempt for us, the thirty-year-old indigenous woman tells IPS. Yet I was warmly welcomed.
While around 80 percent of Congolese women give birth in health facilities, fewer than one in four indigenous women give birth at health centres.

Widespread discrimination

In 2007, indigenous people in Congo numbered 43,500, just under two percent of the country s population of 3.7 million. To promote and protect their rights, a law was…

PAKISTAN: Taliban Bombs Get Deadlier

PESHAWAR, Jan 20 2012 (IPS) – In their efforts to kill and injure more people as part of a terror campaign in northern Pakistan, the Taliban militia have resorted to lacing bombs with toxic chemicals that leave survivors with complicated wounds.
Taliban bombs are now laced with chemicals. Credit: Ashfaq Yusufzai/IPS.

Taliban bombs are now laced with chemicals. Credit: Ashfaq Yusufzai/IPS.

The new techniques devised by the militants are designed to inflict complicated injuries on the survivors of the bombings and suicide attacks. They develop contractures and physical deformities, said Muhamma…