Herbal Medicine, Diabetes Care at Primary Care Facilities and Prevention of Vertical HIV Transmission

In this September 2021 issue of the Malawi Medical Journal, three articles which attracted my attention are those by Mbali et al, Zimba et al, and Pfaff et al. Perhaps as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal, I should endeavor to be impartial and “love” all the articles the same. This time however, I have selected these articles because they touch on important health issues in Malawi, with Mbali et al, reporting on the use of herbal medicines among individuals living with HIV and receiving life-saving antiretroviral therapy (ART)

Personal View: How IMF’s loan freeze will affect health care in Malawi

No Abstrac

A Deeper Look: Looking Into the Lives of People and Projects That Are Making a Difference in Malawi

No Abstrac

Is contagion having the last word?

The Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Corona Virus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and the disease it causes, i.e. Covid-19 outbreak1, emerged around the same time I had just finished teaching postgraduate students on two widely presented models: the epidemiologic and the demographic transitions2,3. In our discussions, we tackled the classical presentations of these two models. The epidemiologic transition posits that as countries become more developed, infectious or communicable diseases contribute a smaller proportion of their overall mortality while non-communicable diseases predominate

Serological survey of antibodies to Toxoplasma gondii

Toxoplasmosis is one of the most prevalent parasitic infections of man and livestock, and its transmission has usually been attributed to ingestion of undercooked or raw meat from infected livestock, with the infection rate in those animals being an important risk predictor of human disease, high in Iran and Ardabil State. During a study on this public health problem, we tested serum samples from cattle, goats, sheep and chicken from the State of Ardabil, Iran, for IgG antibodies to Toxoplasma gondii by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Antibodies to Toxoplasma gondii were found in 30% (60/200) of sheep, 15% (30/200) of goats and 9% (18/200) of cattle, and none were found in chicken sera. Despite the differences in feeding habits of each species, the rate of infection of the animals tested could be attributed to livestock management methods, whose improvement could reduce infection. African Journal of Health Sciences Vol. 13 (1-2) 2008: pp. 131-13

Shortage of health workers in the Malawian public health services system: how do parliamentarians perceive the problem?*

The quality and quantity of health care services delivered by the Malawi public health system is severely limited, due to, among other things the shortage of adequate numbers of trained health care workers. In order to suggest policy changes and implement corrective measures, there may be need to describe the perceptions of the legislature on how they perceive as the cause of the problem, which could be the solutions and an evaluation of those solution. In this paper, I present the finding from a qualitative study of Hansards (official verbatim record of parliamentary speeches) analysed by discourse analysis. Parliamentarians identified the shortage of health workers as resulting from death, retirement and brain drain to other countries mostly the UK, Saudi Arabia and South Africa. Training more health workers, training new but lower cadres of health workers not marketable to the outside world, improving the working conditions and remuneration of health workers are suggested as some of the solutions. Even without the brain drain of health workers to other countries, Malawi\'s health sector personnel numbers are not adequate to serve the needs of the country. Relying on training more health workers in the numbers normally produced from the prevailing training institutions is unlikely to remove the shortages. African Journal of Health Sciences Vol. 13 (1-2) 2008: pp. 124-13

To screen, or not to screen for SARS-Cov2

One of the trappings, if not a burden, to Editors-in-Chief (EIC) of many medical journals is that one is expected to write editorials. Thus attempting to speak from the Mount, the EIC has the opportunity to identify one or more issues they think is/are important for the readership at that time or had been in the past or for the future

Explaining the gender disparities in SARS-Cov 2 infection and Covid-19 Disease in Malawi

Global Covid-19 data show that there is higher morbidity and mortality among males compared to females1-3. Why, is this the case, and what needs to be done to save lives? Alternatively is this a situation where the observed status is only good for reporting but not worth interventions

Recent changes in the Malawi Health System: A time for reflection

In this editorial I intend to present a summary of the key issues which have happened in the health sector in Malawi up to the end of 2019. I do believe doing so not only preserves the record but also encourages discussion and debate that may impact the health sector