The adoption of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s) in 2015 marked a shift in the global development agenda from the earlier Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) era. SDGs are particularly important for the health sector, since they reaffirm the premise of the Alma Ata declaration that health cannot exist in isolation. SDG’s intrinsically link health with actions […]
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Naomi Hossain: The right to food is common sense in Bangladesh
Horrifying new reports of famine on a vast scale in Yemen, South Sudan, Somalia, and Nigeria are emerging, signalling the lack of a real right to food among tens of millions of people. Climate change and conflict are leading to recurrent food crises. These unfolding episodes resemble the story of the last famine in Bangladesh, […]
Priscilla Claeys: Ensuring the right to food for rural working people
On 18 January 2017, the issue of the human rights of agricultural workers with no land of their own and other people working in rural areas was placed on the agenda of the European Council Working Party on Human Rights (COHOM) for the first time. As a researcher studying how the human rights regime is […]
R N Karuga: “Building a resilient and responsive health system needs strong community support”
“Forget about these people in the national office,” said Maria (not her real name). “They are not in touch with reality!” Maria is a district health manager in Kenya. This was her response when I asked how closely she works with the national Ministry of Health in delivering community health services. In 2013, the governance […]
What can we learn from the European Union’s first right to food law?
By Tomaso Ferrando and Roberto Sensi. In this second article on the #RightToFood, part of a BMJ Global Health series, we discuss our experience of the conception and enactment of a right to food law in Lombardia, Italy. The “Recognition, Protection and Promotion of the Right to Food,” was approved by the Lombardia Regional Council in November 2015. […]
Jose Luis Vivero-Pol and Tomaso Ferrando: Let’s talk about the right to food
Legal recognition of the right to food and nutrition can create the grounds for effective and systemic solutions for hunger and malnutrition. Recently, the media was abuzz with news of plans by the Scottish Equalities Secretary to legislate the right to food within Scottish law. This would be a step towards tackling food poverty in […]
Adesoji Ademuyiwa: Improving child survival following emergency surgery
As a paediatric surgeon in Nigeria, my experience is that child survival following emergency surgery is lower compared to children in more developed countries. This is especially the case in the neonatal period. Studies in countries with a low to middle Human Development Index (HDI) have documented several challenges associated with this issue—delays in presentation […]
Aderemi Oyedeji and Anja Choon: Stigmatization of mental health problems in Nigeria
The BMJ Global Health blog Mental health is neglected and stigmatized globally and across societies, in spite of its high burden. Moreover, in Nigeria, mental health is not just neglected but remains completely absent from key health sector documents. There is a glimmer of hope though, in the form of a revised mental health policy from 2013, […]
Soumyadeep Bhaumik: Social media in global health
The BMJ Global Health blog The connectivity made possible by social media is one of the most important revolutionary changes in the last decade. And The BMJ has always encouraged openness, transparency, and multi-stakeholder involvement, through blogs and other social media. The BMJ now has an extensive blog portfolio. At BMJ Global Health, we have […]