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Alliance News Digest

WEEK OF 03 JULY 2009

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AFRICA AND MIDDLE EAST

• LESOTHO: Nurse-led model can work - Irin/PlusNews
  A pilot programme in Lesotho has demonstrated that primary health care clinics run by nurses can successfully deliver HIV and TB care and treatment services to patients in remote rural areas.
  

• Strike Paralyses Health Services in Adamawa - Daily Trust, Nigeria
  Health services in public hospitals and clinics in Adamawa State have been paralysed as health workers in the state began an indefinite strike yesterday.
  

• Nurses Call Off Strike - Times of Zambia
  STRIKING health workers in Lusaka, Livinstone and Kitwe yesterday resolved to call off their boycott as police in Ndola arrested five nurses for unlawful assembly.
  

• Doctors Defy 'Return to Work' Court Order - Business Day, SA
  On Saturday, the Labour Court in Durban granted the Department of Health an interim interdict ordering health workers to return to work.
  

• Resident Doctors, Others Call Off Strike - This Day, Nigeria
  Following an agreement reached between the State Government and the Association of Resident Doctors and other health workers in the state at the weekend, the unions have called off the strike.
  

• Rockefeller Pledge Support to Health Systems - New Times, Rwanda
  The Rockefeller Foundation, a US-based philanthropic organisation has pledged to work hand in hand with the Government of Rwanda to strengthen the country's health systems.
  

• Zim Nurses Ready to Work in Country - Times of Zambia
  THE Government has said nurses from neighbouring Zimbabwe are ready to work in Zambia on local conditions of service and made a final appeal for health workers to call off their strike or lose employment.
  

• Ouganda: Les structures sanitaires proche du point de rupture - IRIN-Africa
  Actuellement, un médecin jeune diplômé gagne de 280 à 550 dollars, et un consultant expérimenté gagne jusqu'à 680 dollars. De nombreux médecins ont été obligés de quitter leur pays pour trouver un meilleur emploi ailleurs.
  

• Addis Ababa / Conference on “Human Resources for Maternal Survival: Task-shifting to Non-Physician Clinicians” - African Press Organization
  Some 350 participants , including Ministers of Health, senior government officials, health programme managers, clinicians and heads of health training institutes, from 36 African countries, are meeting in Addis Ababa in a conference on “Human Resources for Maternal Survival: Task-shifting to Non-Physician Clinicians”.
  

• 'Give docs what they want' - News24, SA
  I have sympathy for the doctors who have decided to strike in South Africa, simply because the powers that be do not listen or appreciate the importance of the current public health care problems South Africa is facing.
  
  

ASIA AND PACIFIC

• UK more reliant on care workers from India: study - The Hindu, India
  Britain is increasingly reliant on foreign-born care workers – particularly in London where six out of all care workers are now foreign-born, including from India, a study says.
  

• WHO calls for world response to IDP crisis in Pakistan - Xinhua News, China
  The international community should be more responsive in the crisis of the internally displaced people (IDPs) in Pakistan.
  

• Medical workers continue strike in Dang - República, Nepal
  Health workers have closed health posts and halted all medical services in Rapti zone in continuation of the banda called by them to protest the attack on Dr Ishwor Raj Devkota at Rapti Zonal Hospital.
  

• Shortage of 28,000 health centres in India: Economic Survey - Economic Times, India
  There has been an improvement in the health sector but India faces a shortage of over 28,000 health centres, the Economic Survey 2008-09 said Thursday.
  

• Public health brigade urged to stand up and be counted - Crikey.com, Australia
  In the article below, Professor Glenn Salkeld, head of the School of Public Health at the University of Sydney, gives an overview of the Nutbeam review and urges colleagues to “get active”.
  

• Health workers encouraged to study - Fiji Times
  THE Ministry of Health has encouraged its staff to conduct researches to help improve health services.
  

• GPs fight indentured labour - The Australian
  Rural life isn't the right life for all overseas doctors, and Aussie country medicos back their fight for choice, reports Siobhain Ryan.
  

• UQ Professor leaves Health in better shape - University of Queensland News, Australia
  "Peter Brooks has achieved an outstanding reputation locally, nationally and internationally for leadership in a range of areas, including initiatives to meet future health workforce needs," Professor Greenfield said.
  
  

NORTH AMERICA

• Obamacare won't survive coming doctor shortage - Washington Examiner
  President Obama's ambitious plan for radically increasing the government's role in the nation's health care system misses one critical detail: There aren't enough primary care physicians in America now and their numbers are declining.
  

• Health Care: No Shortage of Ideas (Letter) - New York Times
  Re “The Prescription From Obama’s Own Doctor,” by Nicholas D. Kristof (column, June 25).
  

• Is the nursing shortage really over? - Bizmology. TX
  Hard economic times have brought about changes in many industries, and health care is far from immune. For years nursing has been a nearly guaranteed employment choice for candidates up to the challenge.
  

• Doctor shortage proves painful to state - Times Argus, VT
  Much of the state is short on primary care providers at a time when the nation as a whole is searching the same pool of doctors.
  

• Study: Nursing remains a recession-resilient career - Vanderbilt University News
  There have been several recessions in our country’s history, but most think about the Great Depression that ended the roaring 1920s – a time when unemployment was at 25 percent for many years. There were expanded needs for rural nurses, but no money to hire them.
  

• Atlas highlights HIV/AIDS burden in Southeast - CNN
  There is also a shortage of doctors who deal with HIV in the region.
  

• Expanded MSU college looks to help heal Mich. doctor shortage - Lansing State Journal, MI
  A shortage of 900 physicians is expected for Michigan by 2010, 2,400 by the year 2015 and as many as 6,000 by 2020, according to the state Department of Community Health.
  

• Iraq Nursing Program Crosses Social Barriers and Offers New Hope - Fox News
  Many Iraqis view nurses as women of loose morals because they work long hours in hospitals, and they treat male patients.
  

EUROPE

• Strengthening health systems to promote security - The Lancet, UK
  We are living through a paradoxical mix of uncertainty and opportunity. The current economic crisis is placing additional strains on a world that is already overburdened by its inability to meet the basic needs of billions of its inhabitants.
  

• BMA meeting: representatives say medical associations should speak out against denial of medical services to civilians -
  The BMA will consider suspending contact with any national medical association that does not speak out against the military targeting of healthcare staff and hospitals or the denial of medical services, representatives at the annual BMA conference have voted.
  

• Moving forward with maternal health and human rights (Editorial) - The Lancet, UK
  500 000 women die each year as a result of pregnancy or childbirth. Efforts are being made to reduce these deaths by three quarters by 2015—Millennium Development Goal 5.
  

• Policy Win For Independent Health Workforce And Training, Australia - Medical News Today, UK
  The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) welcomes the amendments made to the Health Workforce Australia Bill 2009 this week.
  

• Workforce planning for all eventualities - Irish Medical News
  The FÁS report into manpower planning exposes significant shortages in three health professions and oversupply in others. Lloyd Mudiwa reports.
  

• Russia's health promotion efforts blossom - The Lancet, UK
  In a bid to reduce Russia's high rates of preventable disease, the government, with the help of non-governmental organisations, is bringing health promotion to the people. Tom Parfitt reports.
  

• People protectionism - The Economist, UK
  Rich countries respond to the economic downturn by trying to limit the flow of migrants.
  

• 'Lack of urgency' on NHS violence - BBC News, UK
  More than 7,000 incidents of violence and aggression were reported by frontline NHS staff in 2008.
  

• 1.320 sanitarios en la 'UVI' por el euskera - Correo Digital, Spain
  El Gobierno vasco buscará «encaje» a los profesionales que se encuentran en un limbo legal al no aprobar el perfil exigido en los plazos establecidos.
  

• Some 45 000 people die each month in Congo as result of collapsed health service, says UN official - BJM
  The breakdown of the healthcare infrastructure in the Democratic Republic of Congo poses a huge challenge to humanitarian aid groups trying to provide lifesaving health care in the war ravaged nation.
  
  

LATIN AMERICA AND CARIBBEAN

• Neonatólogos podrían retornar a centros críticos - Inteligente, Venezuela
  Es el caso de la Maternidad Concepción Palacios y el Materno-Infantil de Caricuao, donde no hay ni personal médico ni de enfermería especializado para atender la terapia intensiva.
  

• Cinco departamentos necesitan al menos contratar 490 médicos - FMBolivia
  Los Servicios Departamentales de Salud (Sedes) de cinco departamentos del país, Tarija, La Paz, Potosí, Pando y Santa Cruz, necesitan por lo menos 490 médicos para encarar principalmente acciones contra la nueva gripe A.
  

• Intervienen Departamento de Enfermería de Clínicas - ABC Digital, Paraguay
  El Consejo Directivo de la Facultad de Ciencias Médicas de la Universidad Nacional de Asunción (UNA) resolvió ordenar la intervención administrativa del Departamento de Enfermería del Hospital de Clínicas, ante el déficit de gestión.
  

• Trabajadores presentan crítico informe de situación del hospital de Cipolletti - ADNRioNegro, Argentina
  En cuanto a clínica médica el trabajo describe que “faltan médicos y enfermeros, ya que vienen médicos de otros servicios u hospitales a cubrir guardias.
  

• Colegio de Enfermeras respondió con críticas al llamado de Erazo a colaborar - Cooperativa.cl, Chile
  Corral cifró en 700 las enfermeras que faltan en hospitales públicos y otras 1.000 en la atención primaria y acusó molestia por la falta de una propuesta...
  

• Faltam 120 médicos nos PSFs - Diário do Nordeste, Brazil
  Deficiência integra um conjunto de problemas na atenção primária e foi discutida ontem por secretários de Saúde.
  
  

News from WHO and partners

• Health workforce retention in remote and rural areas: call for papers - Bulletin of WHO
  Although approximately one half of the global population lives in rural areas, these people are served by only 38% of the total nursing workforce and by less than a quarter of the total physicians’ workforce.
  

• ICN recognizes outstanding Spanish nurse leader with nursing’s top international award - International Council of Nurses
  “The enthusiastic and charismatic leadership of Dr González Jurado has encouraged nurses around the world to strive for health care excellence” commented ICN President, Hiroko Minami.
  

• Designing financial-incentive programmes for return of medical service in underserved areas: seven management functions - Human Resources for Health Journal
  In many countries worldwide, health worker shortages are one of the main constraints in achieving population health goals.
  

• Understanding informal payments in health care: motivation of health workers in Tanzania - Human Resources for Health Journal
  There is growing evidence that informal payments for health care are fairly common in many low- and middle-income countries.
  

• Family Planning and Reproductive Health Have Fallen Off Global Development Radar ― World Bank/UNFPA
  On the eve of the 20th anniversary of World Population Day, the World Bank and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) warned that family planning and other reproductive health programmes vital to poor women had fallen off the development radar.
  

• United Nations Gathering of Global Experts to Address Current Crisis in Family Planning - UNFPA
  Family planning experts from around the world warn that the lack of funding for family planning is stalling development efforts in poor countries.
  

• Global leaders still committed to MDG Health goals, despite economic downturn - GAVI Alliance
  Leading global health players and donor nations publish an annual status report on the Global Campaign to reach Health Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
  

• The University of New South Wales' Initiative for Health and Human Rights - IHHR, Australia
  INTENSIVE COURSE ON HEALTH, DEVELOPMENT AND HUMAN RIGHTS 7th-11th December 2009, UNSW, Sydney, Australia .