Called the Davos of public health, the mysterious Pacific Health Summit in Seattle is a gathering of top leaders in the field. Science Speaks a blog supported by the IDSA and HIV Medicine association was there. Check out their great series of posts below:

1. Secret global health gathering underway, link
2. Fauci: New TB research agenda desperately needed, link
3. Fighting TB in the mountains of Lesotho, link
4. Photographs from the TB front-lines, link
5. Calls for strengthened lab capacity, service delivery and better policy, link
6. Newsmaker: Seeking partners in Russia to fight MDR-TB, link
7. The question of universal access for TB patients, link
8. At MDR-TB summit’s end, expressions of frustration, link

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• Data on investigational drug TMC207 for MDR-TB published in New England Journal of Medicine (scienceblog.com)
• How Bill Gates caught the global health bug (crosscut.com)

This is a fascinating 10 minute interview from PRI’s Global Health and Development Podcast, definitely worth listening too:

Can Yogurt Slow the Spread of HIV?

12 Jun 2009

Scientist Gregor Reid joins The Takeaway to talk about his work with HIV patients in Africa. He has helped teach a group of ‘yogurt mamas’ in Tanzania how they might serve up disease protection one cup at a time.

Play:

Quote from the podcast: “We have changed from a human spieces that ate a lot of plant foods to food with essentially no organisms at all because we are so paranoid about getting sick.”

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Possibly Related Posts:

• What We’re Reading 5/27/09 (one.org)
• Visiting HIV Clinics in Ghana (one.org)
• HIV in South Africa ‘levels off’ (news.bbc.co.uk)
• Albino trials begin in Tanzania (news.bbc.co.uk)

I have been talking about this kind of thing for years, well the organization that is one of the best in producing useful health information, the Kaiser Family Foundation has a global health page and tracker. The screen shot below is from our friends at Little Devices that Could. This is a good start, but a lot more could be done, not sure why no one is doing it?

Menlo Park, CA – infoZine – With attention to global health rising on the U.S. policy agenda in recent years, the Kaiser Family Foundation launched a set of new resources, providing U.S. policymakers, non-governmental organizations, journalists and others working in the global health arena with timely information, including daily news summaries, a policy tracker tool, and original research and analysis.

The new Kaiser Daily Global Health Policy Report, synthesizes daily coverage from more than 200 news sources pertaining to U.S. policy discussions and debates on global health, including relevant news from around the world. The daily report will cover HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis (TB), malaria, nutrition, water and sanitation, polio, and maternal and child health, as well as funding, financing and health systems.

The World Bank folks (thanks to Pavneet for giving us this info), specifically the Commission on Growth and Development have a blog that they are re-dedicating some attention to:

“In the coming weeks, we will be launching a volume dedicated to issues related to Health and Growth. The volume is co-edited by Nobel Laureate Michael Spence, and World Bank Advisor Maureen Lewis. It features contributions by Sir George Alleyne, David Canning and David Bloom, Simon Johnson and Hoyt Bleakley, among others.  Topics include Early Life Nutrition, Disease and Development, and population health.”

Check out their latest provocative piece:

Health and Growth: A Heretical View?
Submitted by David Weil on Tue, 06/16/2009 – 11:23.

The Boston Globe has a set of pictures that I highly recommend you check out. Occupational hazards is something I don’t see discussed very often in the context of global health and it’s a real shame. For more on occ health in general check out the definitive blog that has done a tremendous job of keeping occ health in the conversation – The Pump Handle.

“In East Java, Indonesia lies Kawah Ijen volcano, 2,600 meters tall (8,660ft), topped with a large caldera and a 200-meter-deep lake of sulfuric acid. The quietly active volcano emits gases through fumaroles inside the crater, and local miners have tapped those gases to earn a living. Stone and ceramic pipes cap the fumaroles, and inside, the sulfur condenses into a molten red liquid, dripping back down and solidifying into pure sulfur. Miners hack chunks off with steel bars, braving extremely dangerous gases and liquids with minimal protection, then load up as much as they can carry for the several kilometers to the weighing station. Loads can weigh from 45 to 90kg (100 – 200 lbs), and a single miner might make as many as two or three trips in a day. At the end of a long day, miners take home approximately Rp50,000 ($5.00 u.s.). The sulfur is then used for vulcanizing rubber, bleaching sugar and other industrial processes nearby.” The Boston Globe

Thanks to Jose for sending this announcement from the Inter American Development Bank – deadline is June 30th:

“In the Science and Technology Division of the Inter-American Development Bank we are looking to support the implementation of pilot projects that use innovation to improve the quality of life and the economic and social inclusion of People with Disabilities in Latin America and the Caribbean. You can apply for funding (for up to US$ 50,000) by submitting your proposal by June 30, 2009. “

Check out their blog and the full announcement.

On a related note, check out the University of Washington’s own initiative in the same area.

Is the below story an opportunity for a design change in healthcare? Notice the attachment to the symbolism of the doctor white coat, it won’t be so easy to get rid of or change (tradition and old habits die hard, never underestimate social factors):

The AMA To Consider Whether Hospitals Should Adopt “Bare Below The Elbows” Dress Code.   In the Wall Street Journal Health Blog, Laura Yao wrote, “One of the policy questions that AMA delegates will consider at their annual conference next week is whether doctors should forgo their iconic white coats for something a little more casual — and a little less dangerous for patients.” Under the proposal, hospitals would be urged “to adopt dress codes of ‘bare below the elbows,’ to avoid carrying bacteria between patients via coat sleeves.” Although “there has been no conclusive evidence linking infected cuffs” to the number of patient deaths “from infections contracted in hospitals,” supporters “argue that as long as there’s the slightest potential of transmission, everything possible should be done to avoid it.” Still, some physicians “prefer the professionalism the white coat implies.”

This debate on doctor’s white coats reminds me of the research from a few years ago showing that doctors ties can harbor lots of bacteria. Considering the evidence is not conclusive on the design of doctors white coats, I am wondering if getting rid of the sleeves might actually make matters worse because then patients and doctors would be exposed directly to more of the human skin which harbors tens of thousands of bacteria (see link for a great NPR report on this).

Cross-posted from Design Research for Global Health:

Atul Gawande’s recent New Yorker article about the super-high costs of healthcare in McAllen, Texas has gotten lots of people talking. (If you haven’t read it, you need to.) In the White House, President Obama made the article White House required reading, as reported by the New York Times:

President Obama recently summoned aides to the Oval Office to discuss a magazine article investigating why the border town of McAllen, Tex., was the country’s most expensive place for health care. The article became required reading in the White House, with Mr. Obama even citing it at a meeting last week with two dozen Democratic senators.

Data show that increased healthcare spending does not necessarily result in better health outcomes, and that the spending varies widely within the US. The Gawande article begins to answer the question of why this is the case, but there is a counterpoint (also from the NYTimes):

In his blog last month, Mr. [Peter] Orszag wrote, “The higher-cost areas and hospitals don’t generate better outcomes than the lower-cost ones.” But other researchers and politicians are not so sure. They say it would be a mistake to cut or cap Medicare payments without knowing why spending in some places far exceeds the national average.

What’s as interesting about Gawande’s article as the story is the fact that the national discussion has been altered by a quick case study of a single town in Texas. (Aside: this is why extreme case sampling is so valuable.) What else can we learn by studying individual systems, sitting down with real providers, and talking to actual patients?

They brought the x-ray machine to me this time. I told the people from Social Services, “There’s no way I can pay for all this”. The doctor came and told me it was a pulled muscle, and to go home, elevate it, and rest. I did just as the doctor said and four days later - four days - I got a call saying “We made a mistake”. Then he said “They made a mistake”. I went to Highland – no Summit – and they showed me two x-rays side-by-side. In the last one my bone was out of its socket and my kneecap was broken in two places. I was in rehab for 12 months!

Visual of the day (from visual economics):

Related to debt, check out this story of the UN writing what would have been a bounced check over at Chris Blattman’s blog.