Emergency &Epidemiology &Social/Cultural &Surveillance Bill Brieger | 17 Aug 2017
The Forest through the Trees: Themes in Social Production of Health
Recently Professor Ayodele S Jegede of the Faculty of Social Sciences, delivered the 419th Inaugural Lecture at the University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria, during the 2016/2017 academic session. Below Prof. Jegede shares an abstract of his lecture.
Knowledge of individual actor’s behaviour is a reflection of the society as tree to the forest. As forest produces large quantities of oxygen and takes in carbon dioxide, society produces the needed resources for human beings to survive through culture. This inter-dependence between man and the environment is summarised by the Yoruba adage which says: “irorun igi ni irorun eye” (meaning: a bird’s peace depends on the peace enjoyed by the tree which harbours it).
Nigeria, a country with a population of about 187 million and a life expectancy of 53 years, 54% of the populace are living below the poverty line with limited access to health care services physically and economically. Although universal health coverage is vital to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) cultural perception of disease aside from loss of economic and low purchasing power makes people to attribute their illnesses to spiritual cause and therefore seek alternative health care services. This influences resistance to public health interventions in some African communities resulting in suspicion and distrust between health educators and the public.
For instance, response to childhood immunizable diseases, mental illness, malaria and HIV/AIDS reported in this lecture was driven by how people define the diseases. Their response did result in delay in seeking modern health care until alternative care sources proved ineffective. This confirms W.I. Thomas (1929: 572) postulation that, “If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences”.
Our stakeholders’ engagement interventions strategies strengthened by knowledge of how people construct their life, socially and culturally, proved to be a potent vaccine for preventing strain relationship between health workers and clients. Since society consists of individuals who constitute the stakeholders conducting health researches as well as management of epidemics and treatment during epidemics and disease episodes require appropriate ethical behaviours.
This suggests that adequate knowledge of the society is inevitable since a tree does not make a forest which confirms Marx Weber’s Action Theory postulation that an act does not become social unless it involves two or more persons. It is, therefore, that government should establish National Disease Observatory System (NDOS) to document diseases by type, location and related local practices for training health care professionals, clinical practice and emergencies preparedness.
Note also that the lecture was featured in the New Nigerian Newspaper with an emphasis on establishing a national disease observatory. The Nigerian Tribune also featured the lecture stressing the importance of disease emergency preparedness.
Diagnosis &Elimination Bill Brieger | 14 Aug 2017
Asymptomatic and Sub-Microscopic Malaria: a Challenge to Elimination Efforts
WHO says that, “In settings where malaria is actively being eliminated or has been eliminated, a “case” is the occurrence of any confirmed malaria infection with or without symptoms.” Several recent studies describe the importance of paying attention to asymptomatic infections.
In the Bagamoyo District of Tanzania Sumari and colleagues collected blood samples and examined them for Plasmodium falciparum prevalence using rapid diagnostic test (RDT), light microscopy (LM) and reverse transcription quantitative PCR. While overall prevalence was higher in symptomatic children using all three methods, asymptomatic children had a higher prevalence of gametocytes using light microscopy and PCR. They concluded that, “The higher gametocytemia observed in asymptomatic children indicates the reservoir infections and points to the need for detection and treatment of both asymptomatic and symptomatic malaria.”
The health effects of asymptomatic plasmodial infections (API) on children were documented in Rwanda. These included “Plasmodium infection was associated with anaemia, fever, underweight, clinically assessed malnutrition and histories of fever, tiredness, weakness, poor appetite, abdominal pain, and vomiting” and were generally more common with submicroscopic infection.
Besides children other groups are at risk from API. Malaria during pregnancy is a life and health threat to both the pregnant woman and the unborn child. Thirty-seven percent of asymptomatic pregnant women who had just delivered in Colombia were found to have parasitemia. Using microscopy only 8% were identified, such that without PCR the true extent of the problem would not have been identified. Thus, there is also concern for submicroscopic malaria and well as API generally. Asymptomatic and submicroscopic infections in areas co-endemic for P. falciparum and P. vivax are major contributors to anemia, not only in children but also in adults.
Working along the China-Myanmar border area, Zhao et al. explained that, “Sensitive methods for detecting asymptomatic malaria infections are essential for identifying potential transmission reservoirs and obtaining an accurate assessment of malaria epidemiology in low-endemicity areas aiming to eliminate malaria.” Thus they tried three molecular detection methods side-by-side, namely nested PCR targeting the rRNA genes, nested RT-PCR to detect parasite rRNA, and CLIP-PCR to detect parasite rRNA.
Interestingly the presence of fever is no guarantee that malaria parasites will be found. A study in Gabon demonstrated that among febrile patients only 1% had parasites found through microscopy compared to 32% through molecular testing. These studies have demonstrated the need for a better understanding of malaria transmission across different zones and strata in a country in the light of asymptomatic and submicroscopic malaria, especially gametocytemia. This should lead to better targeting of case detection, improved treatment and better compliance with preventive measures.
Children &CHW &Human Resources &Mortality &Women Bill Brieger | 02 Aug 2017
Health for All at the International Institute for Primary Health Care, Ethiopia
The time is ripe for a revitalization of the primary health care (PHC) movement. “Health for All through Primary Health Care” (HFA) was first envisioned at the 1978 International Conference on Primary Health Care (World Health Organization and UNICEF), and was enshrined in the Declaration of Alma-Ata. The HFA goal of bringing essential, affordable, scientifically sound, socially acceptable health care provided by health workers who are trained to work as a health team and who are responsive to the health needs of the community, guided by strong community engagement by the year 2000 but has not been fully met. Fortunately the vision of Alma-Ata has taken root, sprouted and flourished in a number of locations.
Thanks to the vision and intellectual and political leadership of Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the then Minister of Health of Ethiopia and recently elected Director General of the World Health Organization, Ethiopia is an outstanding example of the Alma-Ata legacy. Access to PHC services was greatly expanded through the training of 40,000 Health Extension Workers (women from the local area with one year of training, each of whom serve 2,500 people and receive a government salary), recruitment of 3 million community female health volunteers (called the Health Development Army), and engagement with communities to enable them to take responsibility for improving their health.
This expansion of PHC enabled Ethiopia to achieve its health-related MDGs. Child mortality (those younger than 5 years of age) declined from 166 deaths per 1,000 live births in 1990 to 67 in 2016 (MDG 4). Significant progress was achieved in reducing levels of childhood malnutrition (MDG 1). MDG 5 was almost reached, with a decline in maternal morality of 72%, versus the goal of 75%, and the percentage of mothers obtaining a delivery by a skilled provider increased 6-fold between 1995 and 2016. The prevalence rate of modern contraceptive use increased from 6% in 2000 to 35% in 2016. MDG 6 (for HIV, malaria and tuberculosis) was also reached. The number of new HIV infections declined by 90%, and the number of AIDS-related deaths by 53%. Between 1990 and 2015, the tuberculosis incidence and mortality rate declined by 48% and 72%, respectively. The malaria incidence rate declined by 50% and malaria mortality by 60%. Ethiopia’s PHC system is acknowledged as the major factor leading to these impressive health gains.
Representatives from more than half of sub-Saharan Africa countries have come to Ethiopia to see its PHC system in action. Because of this interest, in 2016 the Federal Ministry of Health of Ethiopia established the International Institute for Primary Health Care – Ethiopia, with seed funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and technical support from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Our goal is for the Institute to become a global center of excellence for training, knowledge dissemination and research in primary health care, supported by multiple donors.
The Institute has begun to provide formalized short-term training to high-level policy makers and officials, program planners and managers, as well as to those engaged in service delivery, to see first-hand how an effective national PHC system functions. Trainees come from within Ethiopia and around the world. Trainees also visit communities, meet their leaders, and observe primary health care providers at work. Trainees will return to their home country with renewed energy and new vision and skills to revitalize their own primary health care system.
The Institute will also conduct and support research that yields evidence to guide ongoing strengthening of the Health Extension Program, and will rapidly disseminate open access information about recent advances in PHC. The Institute marks a significant step forward on the road to achieving the Alma-Ata vision of Health for All.
A website for IIfPHC-E is being built to provide further information about these programs and will be available at: www.iifphc.org.
This posting was prepared by: Kesetebirhan Admasu1, Michael J. Klag2, Yifru Berhan Mitke3, Amir Aman4, Mengesha Admassu5, Solomon Zewdu6, Jose Rimon7, Henry B. Perry8
1Chief Executive Officer, Rollback Malaria Partnership, Geneva, Switzerland and Chair, Advisory Board, International Institute for Primary Health Care — Ethiopia
2Dean, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, USA
3Minister, Federal Ministry of Health, Government of Ethiopia, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
4State Minister, Federal Ministry of Health, Government of Ethiopia, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and Co-Chair, Advisory Board, International Institute for Primary Health Care – Ethiopia
5Executive Director, International Institute for Primary Health Care – Ethiopia, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
6Health and Nutrition Development Lead – Ethiopia, Integrated Programs, Global Policy & Advocacy – Global Development, Bill& Melinda Gates Foundation, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
7Director, Bill & Melinda Gates Institute for Population and Reproductive Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, USA
8Coordinator for Johns Hopkins University Support of the International Institute for Primary Health Care – Ethiopia, Department of International Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, USA