The Lancet Digest, May 30-June 6 2008
Margaret Chan puts primary health care centre stage at WHO
See Editorial. Margaret Chan has been WHO’s Director-General for 16 months. At the 61st World Health Assembly (WHA) last week she talked about the priorities for her term, which runs until June 30, 2012. She spoke of three threats to international security: the global-food crisis, pandemic influenza, and climate change. She said that progress towards reaching the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) had stalled and that the world was now in the second phase of the global drive to meet these targets. Her solution to these challenges is the revitalisation of primary health care. “Countries with solid health infrastructures and efficient mechanisms for reaching vulnerable populations will be in the best position to cope” with threats to health security, she told delegates. “If we want to reach the health-related Goals, we must return to the values, principles, and approaches of primary health care.”
China’s health challenges after the earthquake: more than 60 000 people died when a 7.9 magnitude earthquake struck China’s Sichuan province. In the aftermath of rubble, dust, and carnage, health workers are struggling to treat thousands of injured survivors while trying to prevent outbreaks of disease. Jonathon Watts describes the scene in a World Report.
Media headlines from this week’s issue stem from the research Article investigating a possible infectious cause of sudden infant death syndrome, by Neil Sabire, Nigel Klein and Marian Malone from Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, London, UK, and colleagues. The high levels of Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli bacteria found during post-mortems in otherwise unexplained cases of sudden unexpected death in infancy (SUDI) suggest these bacteria could be associated with this condition.
Prednisolone is as effective at treating gout arthritis as naproxen, a conventional treatment; prednisolone could thus be used to treat gout in place of conventional treatments that can cause gastrointestinal, renal, and cardiovascular complications, according to a randomised trial.
Also look out for a Seminar on Tick-borne encephalitis;
And a Review about the use of doping agents, particularly anabolic steroids, in sports and society.
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