Local Govt Forum

Haiti cholera outbreak ‘stopped in its tracks’ WHO A child is administered an oral vaccine against cholera as part of a large-scale vaccination campaign.         24 January 2020 Health After a nine-year long cholera outbreak in Haiti that killed close to 10,000 people, this week the country reached the milestone of an entire year free from any new cases of the deadly waterborne disease. This was achieved following concerted efforts from the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the Haitian Government and others, to address the root causes of cholera. “Cholera is a disease of inequity that unduly sickens and kills the poorest and most vulnerable people – those without access to clean water and sanitation,”  said  PAHO Director, Dr. Carissa F. Etienne. The last confirmed case was a boy under age five in I’Estère in the Artibonite department of Haiti during the last week of January 2019. He was a...

Women outliving men ‘everywhere’, new UN health agency statistics report shows OCHA/Htet Htet Oo Elderly woman in Muse Township, Northern Shan State, Myanmar, March 2018.         4 April 2019 Health Average life-expectancy globally has increased by five-and-a-half years since the turn of the century, and women outlive men “everywhere”, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday. “Whether it’s homicide, road accidents, suicide, cardiovascular disease - time and time again, men are doing worse than women”, said Dr. Richard Cibulskis, main author of  WHO ’s  World Health Statistics Overview 2019. Apart from the average increase from 66.5 years, to 72 years overall, its findings also show that “healthy” life expectancy - the number of years individuals live in full health - increased from 58.5 years in 2000, to 63.3 years in 2016. Differing attitudes to healthcare between men and women...