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The PLACE method is designed to expose sexual and injection drug use networks, identify sites where high-risk populations overlap and help focus interventions where they are most needed. This report presents both a baseline assessment of HIV/AIDS risks and an evaluation of condom promotion programmes in four cities in Central Asia. The report shows that sexual and drug use networks are extensive and diffuse. The rate of new partnership formation is also very high, and the use of condoms with new partners is "quite high". Injection drug use is common, and needles are often shared. The report calls for programmes and interventions to concentrate their efforts on sites at high risk, where there is an overlap of high-risk populations (people meeting new partners, youth, injection drug users, sex workers)

This report argues that a comprehensive HIV/AIDS strategy linking prevention, treatment, care and support for people living with the virus could save the lives of millions of people in poor and middle-income countries. At present, almost six million people in developing countries need treatment, but only about 400 000 of them received it in 2003. The World Health Report 2004 argues that a treatment gap of such dimensions is indefensible and that narrowing it is both an ethical obligation and a public health necessity. In September 2003 WHO, UNAIDS and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria and their partners launched an effort to provide three million people in developing countries with antiretroviral therapy (ART) by end 2005 - the 3 by 5 initiative. This World Health Report shows how a partnership linking international organizations, national governments, the private sector and communities is working simultaneously to expand access to HIV/AIDS treatment, reinforce HIV prevention and strengthen health systems in some of the countries where they are currently weakest

This book is aimed at medical, nursing and other health-care students, and presents a summary of the technical background and the evidence-base underlying the clinical guidelines presented in the companion manual "Management of the Child with a Serious Infection or Severe Malnutrition: Guidelines for Care at the First-Referral Level in Developing Countries" (WHO/FCH/CAH/00.1, ISBN 92 4 154531 3), which should be consulted for treatment recommendations. The book should also be useful for teachers of undergraduates in paediatrics and child health, and for workers in child health as part of their initial training or continuing professional development. It focuses on the major causes of childhood mortality dealing with disease definition, burden of disease, aetiology, pathophysiology, clinical features, and management. In addition, it summarizes the evidence linking these factors to a good/poor outcome and the evidence that intervention can control the factor and/or improve the outcome. This book will be a useful companion study guide to complement undergraduate education in paediatrics in medical and nursing schools

The objective of this report is to describe strategies to reduce global disparities in health through improvements in health research systems at national and international levels and systematic application of evidence-based knowledge. It takes stock of the current state of health research around the world and reaches the following conclusions: increased investments are needed for a new, innovative approach to research on health systems; health research must be managed more effectively if it is to contribute to strengthening health systems and building public confidence in science; stronger emphasis should be placed on translating knowledge into action to improve health by bridging the gap between what is known and what is actually being done. The report provides a compass to reorient health research so that it may respond more effectively to public health challenges on a national and global level. This reorientation requires a strengthening of the health research sector, an environment that is more conducive to research-informed policy and practice, and more focus on key priorities for research to improve health systems. While building on past achievements, the report's recommendations highlight aspects of the health research sector that, if managed more closely, could reap even more benefits for public health in future

This paper offers a conceptual framework and defines the health policy and systems research (HPSR) portfolio as a set of research projects under implementation. The main objective is to identify the themes currently being pursued in the research portfolio and agendas within developing countries and to quantify their frequency in an effort to identify current research topics and their underlying influences. The framework proposed offers a basis to identify and contrast research needs, projects and products at the international level and to identify the actor agendas and their influence. Research gaps are suggested when comparing topic ranking against the challenges to health system strengthening and scaling up of disease control programmes. Differences across per capita income groups suggests the need for differentiated priority setting mechanisms guiding international support. Data suggests that stakeholders have different agendas, and that donors predominate in determining the research portfolio. High-level consensus building at the national and international levels is necessary to ensure that the diverse agendas play a complementary role in support of health system objectives

The purpose of this article is to discuss the potential of the technologies of information in health and to characterise in a preliminary way the subsystems of information in health according to the nature of the information. Although the investigation is fundamentally bibliographical conceptual, it is based on an empirical study of the systems of information in two Venezuelan regions with local governments of different political orientation. Concludes that responsive systems of information in health should contain information coming from different sources: epidemiological, clinical, nutritional, sociodemographic, environmental and occupational, scientific-technique and administrative, and merit as much attention in health as administration of resources. Therefore, coordinated action of ministries of health is required with different institutions

This report summarises the 2001 development of a new computerised information system to register, schedule and track the immunisation of children, which was introduced by the Department of Public Health in Rajshahi City Corporation, Bangladesh. While no direct funding was provided for it, the assumed cost was not more than US $5000. The author concludes that system has been working well for the past three years. He also notes that the utilisation of ICTs in poor countries should be targeted at those intermediaries (such as health workers) who play a key role in the lives of the poor through high-contact service delivery. Empowering those workers and helping improve the effectiveness of their service delivery will do more for the poor than any number of e-government portals