Impact of traditional food and medicine on healthy aging and high life expectancy: Implications for practice

Life expectancy in Sub-Saharan countries is reported to be very low with Zimbabwe having the lowest life expectancy of 34 and 42 years for women and men, respectively. Low life expectancy can be attributed to poverty and low access to health care services. Despite those challenges, some people have lived above 80 years because of a lifestyle fostered using traditional food and medicine. For this study, a qualitative approach through exploratory and descriptive research designs was adopted. Criterion purposive sampling was used to select twenty-five (25) respondents from Ward 4, Bikita District of Masvingo Province in Zimbabwe. The researchers used in-depth interviews and focus group discussions as data collection tools. Thematic Content Analysis (TCA) was employed to analyse the data. The findings of the study indicate people who are accustomed to the use of traditional food and medicine have little consideration for processed food and pharmaceutical medicine. They further revealed that lifestyles fostered using traditional food and medicine contribute to healthy aging and higher life expectancy. There are a lot of traditional herbs that are used to cure a variety of diseases in Zimbabwe. The impact of traditional food and medicine on healthy aging and high life expectancy is based on their availability where people of low socio economic status can easily access them. Traditional medicine is complemented by traditional food in ensuring a prolonged health life in rural Zimbabwe.Keywords: Traditional food, traditional medicine, healthy aging, life expectancy

The Importance of Social Work Roles in Disaster Risk Management in Zimbabwe

This study was aimed at exploring the efficacy of social work roles in disaster risk management in Zimbabwe in the face of climatic changes. It was carried out in Binga district, Matebeleland-North province using the qualitative methodology and a case study design. The study sample was comprised of 8 practicing social workers. Snowballing and purposive sampling techniques were used to select these participants. Data were collected through in-depth interviews using an interview guide. Thematic content analysis was employed to analyze the collected data. It was found that social workers play essential roles before, during and after disasters. On disaster preparedness, it was established that social workers assume roles of educators, community workers and disaster planners. Moreover, it was found that they play the roles of case managers, administrators of social protection and counselors during the disaster response phase of disaster risk management. Subsequently they also act as advocates, development facilitators as well as monitoring and evaluation personnel in the disaster recovery phase. As per the findings, the study recommends that social workers be recognized as essential in disaster risk management at both policy and practice level. Further, there is need to enhance social work training education for flexibility and contextual application of social work knowledge in the field of disaster risk management for quality realization of green social work in Zimbabwe

Internationalisation of Education in the Age of Global Pandemic: Challenges and Prospects

The outbreak of corona virus has created all sorts of ramifications for higher education in South Africa and the world at large. In this case not only the faculty of humanities was affected but all the faculties were affected as the disease has made the plight of students to be a serious concern. Students the world over have been left in a sticky situation amid the corona virus outbreak as government policies and social distancing measures lead to campuses closing. This has resulted in both local and International students leaving for their home. The situation remains uncertain on how the government is going to treat the migrant students and staff who come from all over the world. This chapter highlights some of the challenges that comes with Internationalisation of education like varying cultures, xenophobia, untrained teaching staff; students' assessment and compatibility with Online Distance Learning (ODL). These are challenges which are going to be faced with different universities in South Africa and across the globe. Hence, we advocate for different universities to take pandemic pedagogy as an opportunity to offer and adjust their programmes to online teaching. In this chapter we advance the adoption of ADDIE model as an instrument to use in designing effective online curriculum. These are a snippet view of how institutions can overcome the lockdown and carter as well for their International students in the days of uncertainty regarding mobility in the future. However, with good strategies stated above the future of education is certain. The pandemic is both a curse and an opportunity for universities to adjust to ODL and enhance their preparedness

Review of Disaster Response Strategies for Sustainable Development in the Wake of Flood Risks in Zimbabwe's Rural-urban Settlements

This paper aims to review the disaster response strategies implemented by the Government of Zimbabwe to mitigate the effects of floods in between 2016 and 2019. The daunting impacts of climate change are manifesting through floods, hurricanes, heat waves and drought in Sub Saharan Africa. As such, Zimbabwe is on record of falling victim to floods caused by torrential rains. Floods that struck Zimbabwe had calamitous consequences recorded where hundreds of people died, thousands displaced, infrastructure was destroyed, and people left vulnerable to diseases. Despite the country's participation in International and regional conventions that recognizes climate change impacts and the need to develop modest disaster preparedness and recovery plans, Zimbabwe has been crawling to proactively formulate and implement disaster recovery mechanisms. As such, the country has been ravaged by floods unprepared where reactive disaster response strategies would be ignited. Having said that, this paper examined how the Government of Zimbabwe responded to the unusual occurrences of flash floods in both rural and urban settlements. The empirical analysis is based largely on data from databases such as the national surveys and literature. This paper argues that there is a robust need for the country to invest in disaster risk and recovery plans and disaster early warning systems where communities are not ambushed by gruelling occurrence of floods and its associated risks

Climate Change Impacts and Effects on Health System: A Challenge Towards Achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 3 in South Africa

The aim of this paper is to present climate change health related effects that may pose a challenge for South Africa to attain South Africa's plans to achieve Sustainable Development Goal (SGD) 3. It examined South Africa's preparedness to address the impacts of climate change in order to best achieve SDGs 3. Climate change is a challenging phenomenon, which has seen many people around the world being affected by its effects unaware and unprepared. Climate change affects weather patterns, for instance rainfall patterns and temperatures. Consequently, this resulted in draughts, floods, diseases, veld fires, high temperatures, changing times of floods occurrences and depleted water resources in Africa and the rest of the world. This has placed human life in danger. Considering the increasing burden of diseases, the United Nations (UN) adopted Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to address of poverty, hunger disease and want by 2030. However, climate change threatens the ability of countries to achieve this by the anticipated time. The researchers conducted an extensive content analysis by interrogating various sources of literatures sources that include journal articles, thesis, academic books, and documents written by the government of South Africa. The study reveals that that climate related deaths will increase between 2030 and 2050 due to these health impacts of climate change. The study reveals that South Africa, like many other countries in Sub-Saharan Africa faces threat of vector borne diseases, mental health, malnutrition, and diarrheal, and other disease resulting from water scarcity and heat waves. This comes because of high prevalence of drought, floods, and increased temperatures. The study recommends early awareness and new communication strategies for the promotion of mental health, heat education campaign and prevention of vector borne diseases. &nbsp