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Health in Africa

  • UNICEF gets 1.5 mln USD for emergency support in Uganda

    UGANDA, 2015/12/08 The UN's Children's agency has received 1.5 million U.S. dollars from the British government for emergency support in Uganda where El Nino rains continue to cause havoc. United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in a statement said the support will benefit children and women from the 32 highly affected in the east African country. The agency said the continuous heavy rains have caused flooding and water logging, exposing children and women to a better risk of disease outbreaks such as cholera, malaria, diarrhea and typhoid part others.

  • Fear of cholera, floods as Burundi refugees pack Tanzania camps

    BURUNDI, 2015/11/23 Heavy rains, flooding and a spike in new arrivals could threaten the lives of over 110,000 Burundian refugees in overcrowded camps in Tanzania, six aid agencies said on Monday, amid warnings of rising political tension in Burundi. Life-threatening malaria and diarrhoea have been spreading in Nyarugusu, the world's third major refugee camp, since the rainy season began, and damage caused by a powerful El Nino has left aid agencies short of funds throughout east Africa. "Refugees are arriving in their hundreds each day," the agencies, which include Oxfam, Save the Children and HelpAge International, said in a statement.

  • How Traditional Healers Helped Defeat Ebola in Sierra Leone

    SIERRA LEONE, 2015/11/06 A year and a half next the Ebola outbreak began there is at last good news for Sierra Leone. On Saturday it is expected the country will reach 42 days since the last recorded case, meaning it will be officially declared Ebola free. A lot of of the almost 4,000 Sierra Leoneans killed by Ebola were medical personnel, says the World Health Organization. The small West African country suffered the majority cases and healthcare has "been extremely compromised with a disproportionate number of workers dying", according to a statement on the United Nations' ReliefWeb site. While rebuilding efforts will no doubt focus on doctors, supplies and facilities, experiences during the epidemic indicate that resuscitating Sierra Leone's moribund health system will be as much a cultural endeavour as it is a medical one.

  • Nigeria remains polio-free

    NIGERIA, 2015/10/31 On the heels of historic success against polio in Nigeria and across the continent of Africa, Rotary gives an additional US$6.9 million boost to Nigeria to support immunization activities and surveillance spearheaded by the World Polio Eradication Initiative. This was the year at the same time as three became two, with the World Health Organization removing Nigeria from the inventory of polio-endemic nations, leaving just Afghanistan and Pakistan remaining. With no case of wild poliovirus (WPV) reported since 24 July 2014, additional than a year has passed with no samples testing positive for WPV across all country. This succcess is a tribute to the hard work of countless health care workers, traditional leaders, over 400,000 volunteers and the government who managed to turn the programme in Nigeria around by reaching over 45 million children repeatedly with polio vaccines.

  • Rwanda, Health Insurance for the poor

    RWANDA, 2015/10/13 Reports indicate that only 65 % of the people targeted for Mutuelle de santé have paid their premiums and 35 % have not paid. Because of this, the government has made its stance clear that it will be locking out those who have not paid premiums for the social medical insurance plan. The scheme, which is handled by Rwanda Social Security Board (RSSB), has been one of the initiatives which has garnered a lot of regional and international praise for the government. The globally lauded universal medical insurance plan targeting the poor and vulnerable has cemented the RPF leadership as a pro-poor establishment with the credentials to support and uplift people out of poverty and other vulnerabilities.

  • No Medical Assistance Available in Leer, Following Repeated Lootings of MSF Facility

    SOUTH SUDAN, 2015/10/11 Civilian populations in Leer and Mayendit Counties have once again been deprived of access to urgently needed medical and humanitarian assistance next a Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) compound in Leer was looted twice by well-organized armed men on 2 and 3 October. As a result, MSF was forced to suspend medical activities and evacuate its team from Leer. "MSF strongly condemns these armed robberies of its medical personnel and facilities," says MSF Emergency Manager Tara Newell. "These incidents have forced MSF to suspend its medical activities in Leer and they are responsible for depriving the people of urgently needed medical assistance." On Friday, 2 October, amid renewed clashes, MSF was looted by well-organized armed men who entered its compound with their weapons, intimidated MSF staff with threat of violence and stole medical supplies, vehicles, technical equipment and personal belongings. MSF remained in Leer to continue providing medical assistance to war-wounded patients who were receiving treatment at the time of the incident.

  • New ARV Treatment Guidelines for HIV Patients, Namibia

    NAMIBIA, 2015/10/11 HIV-positive patients will hereafter go on antiretroviral treatment as any minute at this time as they test positive, unlike in the completed where they had to wait for their CD4 count to drop to a certain level, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced last week. This is one of the two new guidelines that were released at the end of last month by the WHO. The guidelines will form part of the WHO's revised and updated 2016 guidelines on the use of antiretroviral drugs for treating and preventing HIV infections. The new guidelines are set for release in December. WHO said the expanded use of antiretroviral treatment is supported by recent findings from clinical trials confirming that early use of ART keeps people living with HIV alive and healthier, and reduces the risk of transmitting the virus to partners. Unlike in the completed at the same time as HIV-positive patients were mainly treated next their CD4 count had dropped to 500 cells/mm3 before going on antiretrovirals, the new guidelines set by the WHO recommend that patients go on treatment as any minute at this time as they test positive.

  • Nigeria is still a World Health Organization-certified Ebola free country‎

    NIGERIA, 2015/10/11 Contrary to claims of an Ebola outbreak in Calabar, Cross River National, Nigeria is still a World Health Organization-certified Ebola free country‎, the Federal Ministry of Health has said. ‎Linus Awute, the permanent secretary of the ministry, said there was no basis for rumours of from presently on an extra outbreak of the virus. "We are as well going to organize a press conference today. You know the news and rumours of Ebola in Calabar... ," Mr. Awute told PREMIUM TIMES over the phone on Friday.

  • Development of Chinese Anti-Malaria Medicine Beneficial to Developing Countries

    CHINA, 2015/10/09 Guinea's Deputy Coordinator for the National Anti-Malaria Program Dr. Timothee Guilavogui on Monday expressed confidence that "the development of traditional Chinese medicine will contribute to helping developing nations to resolve their public health problems."I Interview in Conakry, Guilavogui hailed Chinese pharmacologist Tu Youyou for her research that led to the discovery of Artemisinin, a drug that has significantly reduced the mortality rates for patients suffering from malaria. On Monday, Madam Tu, alongside Irish-born William Campbell and Japan's Satoshi Omura were jointly awarded the 2015 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for discoveries that helped doctors fight malaria and infections caused by roundworm parasites. According to the Nobel Assembly at Sweden's Karolinska Institute, Tu won half of the prize while Campbell and Omura were jointly awarded the other half of the prize. She is the initial Chinese women national to win a Nobel Prize.

  • Nigeria will continue to keep vigil over polio

    NIGERIA, 2015/09/29 Nigeria will continue to keep vigil over polio to make sure that the virus does not re-emerge in the West African country, a presidency statement said Sunday. The African country was declared polio-free on Saturday by the World Health Organization, following the absence of any case of the wild polio virus since July 24, 2014. In spite of the succcess, surveillance activities and immunization will continue across Nigeria to keep the country polio-free at all times, the presidency statement, signed by presidential spokesman, Femi Adesina, said.
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