WHO pledges to fight hepatitis B

Source: WHO

The World Health Organization pledged on Wednesday to focus on nine Western Pacific Region countries that have faced significant challenges in achieving a 2012 target to reduce hepatitis B infection rates among children.

Amani: One of the vaccine delivery heroes

Source: Blog 4 Global Health

Resourceful, brave, committed — and perhaps a little addicted — that’s the kind of person it takes to ensure that vaccines reach children in the poorest countries of the world. People like Amani Abdelmoniem Mustafa, the manager of the Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI) for one of the largest countries in Africa — Sudan.

Uganda announces elimination of Maternal and Neonatal Tetanus

Source: UNICEF

Uganda today announced that it has eliminated maternal and neonatal tetanus (MNT). The country is the 20th to do so since 2000.

An aid innovation that’s saving lives

Source: CNN

thankfully, there’s a lot more to aid agencies than stodgy bureaucrats shoveling money out the door. One recent example is called the advanced market commitment, and it is helping to develop new treatments for diseases, which kill millions in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

Stronger civil society means more power for the weak

Source: The Guardian | Poverty matters blog

There are a few truths in development that I hold to be self-evident and this is one of them: no matter what the problem, stronger civil society is always part of the answer. Unfortunately, as my colleague David Booth has pointed out to me, I don't have much evidence for this assertion, and on the face of it, it appears weak (don't you hate it when people insist on evidence?).

A Haunting Memory of the Girl with Pneumonia

Source: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation | Mercy Ahun blog

Immunising children against polio in remote Ghanaian villages a decade or so ago, I came across a case of pneumonia that has haunted me to this day. A couple of decades later, I still wonder what happened to this child. My mind refuses to accept the obvious. But this is my motivation for working at the GAVI Alliance.