Just in time for National Women’s Day in South Africa, Human Rights Watch published a report last week on failing maternal care in the country. South Africa has seen its maternal mortality ratio quadruple in the last ten years. The report focuses on the Eastern Cape, one of the least developed provinces in the country, […]
This post is not really about global health. However, there’s little in the news to go on (which sort of contributes to my later points) as the famine in Somalia and drought in East Africa are everywhere in the media recently, as are photos of starving children. Apart from being a very real humanitarian crisis, […]
Well, it’s a new week and the same old, same old is happening in Washington. The House Appropriations Committee has released the 2012 State and Foreign Operations Bill and, unsurprisingly but disappointingly, in its current form the bill proposes an 18% cut below last year’s appropriation. The proposed total on for appropriations is $39.6 billion, […]
I’ve written about the potential positive effects of mobile technology on global health and human rights before, but I came across a paper from AudienceScapes (PDF) on inequalities in mobile phone access and penetration rates in lower-income countries and thought I’d follow up. The brief, by Gayatri Murthy, outlines the gender and wealth disparities that […]
This week, The Guardian reported that the CIA fabricated a vaccination program in Abbottabad, Pakistan, as part of its efforts to track down Osama Bin Laden. The scheme was hatched in an attempt to collect DNA from the Bin Laden family to verify its presence in the area. This tactic is concerning, to say the […]
Documenting the seldom-seen world of child brides Photographer Stephanie Sinclair is interviewed about her work documenting child brides — some as young as 5 — in Nepal, India, Yemen, Afghanistan, the U.S. and elsewhere. An estimated 50 million girls younger than 18 in developing countries were married, with 100 million more expected during the next […]
Original photo here, taken by NYC-MetroCard / CC BY Public Health researchers at Columbia’s Mailman School of Public Health released a study last month that estimates the number of deaths in the US in 2000 due to social factors such as poverty, low education, and income inequality. The researchers conducted a meta-analysis of 47 studies […]
Study shows that AD syringes help stem infections from vaccination shots The Measles Initiative and the GAVI Alliance (formerly the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation) announced today that infections resulting from the re-use of syringes for immunizations have been reduced to practically zero in sub-Saharan Africa, according to a study released in the Supplement […]
Over the past week, reports have emerged about pervasive lead poisoning in China and allegations of a cover-up and intimidation by the Chinese government. The New York Times had a prominent article this week and Human Rights Watch has released a 75-page report. Of course, we’re talking about a regime that already drastically represses the […]
I had the pleasure of gorging a bit (no pun intended, but please read on) on TED talks a few days ago, and in the process, spent a couple hours listening to several talks in their “Food Matters” theme. One talk in particular by Carolyn Steel captured my interest: How Food Shapes our Cities. Carolyn is […]
It looks like Cynthia and I had the same idea this week. So instead of a traditional post, I’d like to do a little link-mailing today. As she wrote earlier this week, there are a lot of interesting things to share. First, the wonderful “In Focus with Alan Taylor” photography blog at The Atlantic says […]
On the HIV/AIDS front, news has been coming fast and furiously this week and last, as the United Nations conducts its High Level Meeting on HIV/AIDS, South Africa hosts its HIV/AIDS conference in Durban and the media takes the opportunity to commorate the 30-year anniversary of the global fight against AIDS. I thought I’d link to […]
Recent events in North Africa and the Middle East have brought to the forefront the fragility of government institutions and have questioned the legitimacy of authoritarian regimes in a number of developing nations. The right form of governance for the right society has never been easy to identify. A lot of times, societies have adopted […]
There’s a tricky gray area in the non-profit world around “mission creep” and funding when it comes to human rights. Non-profit organizations (and charitable foundations) obviously want to maximize their funding. And most NGOs, or people working for or supporting NGOs, care about more than one issue, even if they have a narrow focus: generally, […]
A few weeks ago, I wrote about the new Medicare initiative to reward hospitals with better performance metrics, and punish those with worse. On Monday, the New York Times published an article which gave greater detail about the proposed payment methodology. According to the article, the “plan has drawn fire from hospitals” due to a clause which requires […]