Latest KFF Health News Stories
DRC Government, UNICEF Campaign Immunizes 14M Children Against Polio
“Thousands of vaccination teams have traversed the vast Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) on foot, by motorbike, boat and car, in a campaign to immunize at least 14 million children against polio, the U.N. Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said,” IRIN reports. The campaign, which was run over three days beginning October 20 by the government with support from UNICEF, also provided vitamin A supplements and deworming, IRIN notes.
Seasonal Rains, Flooding Lead To Cholera Outbreak In Nigeria
“Seasonal rains cause massive damage and disease throughout Nigeria each year, and this year’s onslaught comes as international experts warn West Africa is suffering from its worst cholera outbreaks in years,” the Associated Press/ABC News reports. According to UNICEF, Nigeria “had recorded more than 21,000 cholera cases this year by the end of September” and “[a]t least 694 people have died from the disease,” the news agency writes. Twenty-five of Nigeria’s 36 states have reported cholera cases, with most coinciding with local flooding, the AP notes, adding that “almost half of Nigeria’s 150 million people lack access to clean water and proper sanitation, according to the World Health Organization” (Gambrell, 10/26).
International Community Must Help Women Fight HIV/AIDS In Swaziland
Women living with HIV in Swaziland “fight a tireless tripartite battle against HIV, the stigma it places on them, and their inferior status in Africa’s last absolute monarchy,” freelance journalist Gary Nunn writes in the Guardian’s “Poverty Matters Blog.” Nunn recounts the story of Siphiwe Hlophe, who founded Swaziland for Positive Living (Swapol) in 2001, and writes, “Women operate at grassroots level in tackling HIV because they’re rarely trusted with real responsibility. But they are increasingly making their voices heard.”
First Edition: October 27, 2011
Today’s early morning highlights from the major news organizations, featuring details of the Super Committee’s latest action — the Dems’ $3 Trillion Debt Deal, which includes a $400 Million Medicare Plan; and the GOP counter appoach.
A Push For New ‘Grand Bargain’ On The Super Committee
The $3 trillion package offered by Democrats to reduce the deficit would include cuts to health programs, including Medicare, and new taxes.
The Guardian Examines China’s One-Child Policy
The Guardian examines China’s one-child policy and its impact. The newspaper writes that “the description of the system as a ‘one-child policy’ is misleading. Most married women in China have the chance to bear two offspring, but the entitlement to breed beyond a solitary child is determined by a complex set of rules” and factors. In fact, the policy’s “countless adjustments over the past 30 years have created a mind-bogglingly complex system that touches on everything from contraception and sterilization to pensions and tax incentives,” according to the Guardian. The newspaper notes that “across all of China, the government claims there would be more than 300 million more children without the family planning policy” and that “the nation’s population is forecast to peak around 2030,” leading “many [to] say the family planning policy had outlived its usefulness.” It also describes the policy’s effects in Henan Province, which “claims some of the greatest successes in taming demographic growth through its family planning policies” (Watts 10/25).
Babatunde Osotimehin, the executive director of the U.N. Population Fund (UNPFA), said in an interview with the Guardian that “efforts to expand family planning services in the developing world stalled for a decade while global health organizations turned their energies to fighting HIV/AIDS. ‘We made a mistake. We disconnected HIV from reproductive health. We should never have done that because it is part and parcel,’ he said.” The newspaper adds, “Osotimehin said the international community was regaining momentum in its efforts to make family planning services available to women in all countries” and “argued it was crucial for developing countries to devote a larger share of their own resources to family planning and health.”
UNICEF Issues Statement Clarifying Reports Of Polio Cases In Madagascar
UNICEF released a statement on Tuesday correcting an October 21 report by its office in Madagascar “expressing concern over a resurgence of polio in Madagascar after a routine health survey identified vaccine-derived poliovirus (VDPV) in several healthy children.” According to the statement, “there was no re-emergence of polio in Madagascar,” and “[t]he last wild poliovirus case in Madagascar was detected in 1997.”
Perry Unveils New Economic Plan
Media outlets analyze GOP presidential hopeful Rick Perry’s new plan, which would cut discretionary funding by at least $100 billion per year, and would overhaul Medicare and Medicaid. In other news, a new poll uncovers deep distrust of the government, with about a quarter of the public in favor of repealing the entire health law.
As High Court Considers Health Law Challenges, Key Legal Issues Take Shape
Reuters details a number of the key questions that have surfaced in legal briefs related to the Supreme Court consideration of challenges to the health law. Meanwhile, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, in its brief, took a nuanced approach regarding the individual mandate.
Al Jazeera Examines Maternal Mortality In Afghanistan
Al Jazeera examines maternal mortality in Afghanistan, which “remains one of the worst places to be a mother,” 10 years after the beginning of the U.S. war in Afghanistan and “[d]espite billions of dollars in aid and considerable progress.” In an accompanying video, the news service reports, “One in five children born in Afghanistan dies by the age of five, and the statistics for mothers aren’t good either.”
Cholera Epidemic Hits Western, Central Africa
“Western and central Africa are facing one of the biggest cholera epidemics in their history, the World Health Organisation and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said last month, in reporting that more than 85,000 cases of cholera have been registered since the beginning of the year, with nearly 2,500 deaths,” according to Le Monde/Guardian. The newspaper writes, “UNICEF has identified three main cholera epidemic outbreaks in the Lake Chad basin, the West Congo basin and Lake Tanganyika,” and “[f]ive countries — Cameroon, Ghana, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (RDC) and Chad — account for 90 percent of the reported cases and fatalities.”
U.N. Officials Warn Yemen Facing Humanitarian, Health Disasters
High-level officials from UNICEF and the World Food Programme (WFP) this week warned that “[r]outine immunization of children has dropped by 40 percent in some areas of Yemen, leading to outbreaks of polio and measles and reflecting a growing collapse of public services in a country that is on the brink of a humanitarian disaster,” IRIN reports. Earlier this month, U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Valerie Amos cited “conflict, poverty, drought, soaring food prices and collapsing state services” as reasons for widespread suffering of millions of people in the country, according to IRIN.
