Post-Nargis Needs Assessment and Monitoring: ASEAN's Pioneering Response

__Abstract__ Just after Cyclone Nargis struck the coast of Myanmar on 2 and 3 May 2008, the Secretary-General of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Dr Surin Pitsuwan, called on all Member States to provide urgent relief assistance through the framework of the ASEAN Agreement on Disaster Management and Emergency Response (AADMER). A few days later, the Government of the Union of Myanmar agreed to work in coordination with the ASEAN Secretariat to assemble and deploy an ASEAN-Emergency Rapid Assessment Team (ERAT), made up of Government officials and disaster management experts from ASEAN Member States. In the first ever such mission for ASEAN, the ASEAN-ERAT was deployed to Myanmar from 9 to 18 May 2008. Its report was submitted to the Special ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ Meeting on 19 May 2008 in Singapore. At the meeting, the Foreign Ministers agreed to establish an ASEAN-led coordinating mechanism to “facilitate the effective distribution and utilisation of assistance from the international community, including the expeditious and effective deployment of relief workers, especially health and medical personnel.” The result was a two-tiered structure, consisting of the ASEAN Humanitarian Task Force for the Victims of Cyclone Nargis (AHTF), and a Yangon-based Tripartite Core Group (TCG), consisting of ASEAN, the Government and the United Nations (UN), to facilitate day-to-day operations and oversee coordination. The constructive solution that was worked out, that of a tripartite structure involving ASEAN, the UN and the Government, turned out to be not only a successful formula for ensuring access, but also an effective forum for achieving a close and productive relationship with the authorities. This did not exist to the same degree before Nargis. As a result, there was significantly more humanitarian space in the Delta than in any other part of the country, and the TCG played a key role in securing this. This is relevant for Myanmar, as it paved the way for access for information collection in a country where otherwise little was known. All assessments and monitoring exercises were conducted with full access permitted by the Government. This was almost unprecedented for Myanmar. This book documents the types of assessments and monitoring exercises that were carried out under the auspices of the AHTF and TCG, including the deployment of the ASEAN-ERAT; the Post-Nargis Joint Assessment (PONJA) consisting of the Village Tract Assessment (VTA) and the Damage and Loss Assessment (DALA); the Periodic Review (PR) monitoring assessments that followed the PONJA; and the Social Impact Monitoring (SIM) studies. It also includes a section on the Recovery Information Accountability System (RIAS), which tracks funding streams from pledges to outputs received during the Post-Nargis and Regional Partnership Conference (PONAC) on 25 November 2009

Prevalence of Buruli Ulcer in Akonolinga Health District, Cameroon: Results of a Cross Sectional Survey

As long as there is no strategy to prevent Buruli ulcer, the early detection and treatment of cases remains the most promising control strategy. Buruli ulcer is most common in remote rural areas where people have little contact with health structures. Information on the number of existing cases in the population and where they go to seek treatment is important for project planning and evaluation. Health structure based surveillance systems cannot provide this information, and previous prevalence surveys did not provide information on spatial distribution and coverage. We did a survey using centric systematic area sampling in a Health District in Cameroon to estimate prevalence and project coverage. We found the method was easy to use and very useful for project planning. It identified priority areas with relatively high prevalence and low coverage and provided an estimate of the number of existing cases in the population of the health district. The active case finding component of the method used served as an awareness campaign and was an integrated part of the project, creating a network of health delegates trained on Buruli ulcer

Mortality among British asbestos workers undergoing regular medical examinations (1971-2005)

2 Objectives The Great Britain Asbestos Survey was established to monitor mortality among workers covered by regulations to control occupational exposure to asbestos. This study updates the estimated burden of asbestos-related mortality in the cohort, and identifies risk factors associated with mortality. Methods From 1971, workers were recruited during initially voluntary and later statutory medical examinations. A brief questionnaire was completed during the medical, and participants were flagged for death registrations. Standardised Mortality Ratios (SMRs) and Proportional Mortality Ratios (PMRs) were calculated for deaths occurring before 2006. Poisson regression analyses were undertaken for diseases with significant excess mortality. Results There were 15,496 deaths among 98,117 workers followed-up for 1,779,580 person-years. The SMR for all cause mortality was 141 (95 % CI 139-143) and for all malignant neoplasms 163 (95 % CI 159-167). The SMRs for cancers of th

DengueTools: Innovative tools and strategies for surveillance and control of dengue

Dengue fever is a mosquito-borne viral disease estimated to cause about 230 million infectionsworldwide every year, of which 25,000 are fatal. Global incidence has risen rapidly in recent decades with some 3.6 billion people, over half of the world’s population, now at risk, mainly in urban centres of the tropics and subtropics. Demographic and societal changes, in particular urbanization, globalization, and increased international travel, are major contributors to the rise in incidence and geographic expansion of dengue infections. Major research gaps continue to hamper the control of dengue. The European Commission launched a call under the 7th Framework Programme with the title of ‘Comprehensive control of Dengue fever under changing climatic conditions’. Fourteen partners from several countries in Europe, Asia, and South America formed a consortium named ‘DengueTools’ to respond to the call to achieve better diagnosis, surveillance, prevention, and predictive models and improve our understanding of the spread of dengue to previously uninfected regions (including Europe) in the context of globalization and climate change. The consortium comprises 12 work packages to address a set of research questions in three areas: Research area 1: Develop a comprehensive early warning and surveillance system that has predictive capability for epidemic dengue and benefits from novel tools for laboratory diagnosis and vector monitoring. Research area 2: Develop novel strategies to prevent dengue in children. Research area 3: Understand and predict the risk of global spread of dengue, in particular the risk of introduction and establishment in Europe, within the context of parameters of vectorial capacity, global mobility, and climate change. In this paper, we report on the rationale and specific study objectives of ‘DengueTools’. DengueTools is funded under the Health theme of the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Community, Grant Agreement Number: 282589 Dengue Tools