Ever wonder about the impact of pneumonia and related vaccines beyond the direct health impact? Look no further than the Value of Immunization Compendium of Evidence, or VoICE - an open-access database from IVAC. The online tool identifies 95 "key ideas" that demonstrate the value of immunization. Each VoICE key idea includes references from peer-reviewed papers, white papers, expert commentaries, and other sources.
The evidence available through VoICE looks at the ripple effects of vaccine-preventable disease and immunization on the health, economic status, societal wellbeing, and equity of individuals, communities, and nations. Developed to support the advocacy efforts of immunization, child health and global health organizations, VoICE covers issues of vaccine impact ranging from antimicrobial resistance to health security and household poverty risk, and more than two dozen other topics.
An example from VoICE.
The tool presents the concepts and evidence around each issue in progressive detail. Users can collapse or expand each level of detail, view external links and additional information for each source, conduct custom searches and export/download evidence into Excel.
Advocacy Helps to Bridge the Gap between Pneumonia and Society's Response to It
Pneumonia is the leading cause of death among children-under-5 in Nigeria, yet many families are unaware. Thus, a video contest was launched during World Pneumonia Day 2016 to highlight the talents of Nigerian visual artists to create innovative public health messaging. This is the third installment in our blog series about the top three winners of the contest, and their perspectives on health advocacy.
This blog post features a Q&A with first-place winner Olemabu MacNelson, who created an engaging and accessible video for Nigerians in local Pidgin. He recounts his inspiration for the project and how it has invigorated him to continue working in health advocacy.
Côte d'Ivoire: AGIS continues mobilization efforts to prevent childhood pneumonia during African Vaccination Week
The Association Graine d'Ivoire et Santé (AGIS) raised awareness about pneumonia during African Vaccination Week (April 24-30, 2017). While pneumonia is the second leading killer of children-under-5 in Côte d'Ivoire, many families lack the knowledge to adequately prevent and treat the disease. AGIS' efforts reached 800 children through health education and advocacy.
Community-Based Primary Healthcare: The Key to Unlocking Healthcare for All
In February,
The Malaria Consortium published
Community-Based Primary Healthcare: The Key to Unlocking Healthcare for All, to demonstrate the strong potential of community-based primary healthcare (CBPH) to increase health care accessibility in even rural areas. The report dives into the role of CBPH in preventing the most common childhood conditions around the world, such as malaria, pneumonia, diarrhea, acute malnutrition and neglected tropical diseases. The report also provides a compelling case to invest in the scale-up of CBPHC programs.
World Breastfeeding Week 2017
During World Breastfeeding Week (August 1-7), advocates called on donors to invest in supporting women through breastfeeding. Exclusive breastfeeding can help prevent both pneumonia and diarrhea, and plays an important role in improving child health. A Global Breastfeeding Scorecard evaluated conditions in 194 countries and found that only 40 percent of children younger than six months are breastfed exclusively (given nothing but breastmilk) and only 23 countries have exclusive breastfeeding rates above 60 percent.
Melinda French Gates teamed up with artist Kimothy Joy to spotlight the need for better support for breastfeeding mothers.
World Water Week sparked conversations all around the world about the importance of water sustainability and equity. Water, sanitation, and hygiene interventions play a key role in preventing the spread of pneumonia and diarrhea, which affect children's growth, development, and overall health.
Established in 2009, World Pneumonia Day is marked every year on November 12th to r
aise awareness about pneumonia, the world's leading infectious killer of children under the age of five; promote interventions to protect against, prevent and treat pneumonia; and generate action to combat pneumonia.
