Your weekly summary of NCD activities, curated by the WHO NCD Department
SIDS HIGH-LEVEL TECHNICAL MEETING ON NCDs AND MENTAL HEALTH
Recognizing the high burden of NCDs, and the impact of climate and COVID-19 on health and economies in Small Island Developing States (SIDS), WHO, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and the Government of Barbados are co-hosting a High-level technical meeting on NCDs and mental health. The meeting, held yesterday and today, will serve as a follow up to the virtual WHO SIDS Summit for Health held in July 2021 and will be a precursor to the SIDS ministerial conference on NCDs and mental health due to be held in June 2023.
The SIDS High-level technical meeting will look to engage heads of state and government, ministers of health from the WHO SIDS Member States, as well as technical experts from key regional and subregional bodies; partner governments and agencies; civil society; youth; public–private partnerships and academia.
The objectives of the meeting are to:
- Discuss progress, challenges, and opportunities to scale up multisectoral actions on NCDs and mental health to promote well-being, as part of the commitments made under the SIDS Health Summit 2021 and the SIDS Accelerated Modalities of Action (SAMOA) Pathway.
- Present and discuss the WHO NCD Implementation Road Map 2023–2030 and its application in SIDS countries, while considering priorities such as the impact of climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic, to accelerate national responses towards SDG target 3.4 on NCDs and mental health.
- Share experiences from SIDS countries on multisectoral and multistakeholder strategies, especially on NCDs and mental health as they relate to climate change, health emergencies, the COVID-19 pandemic, obesity prevention and food systems, among others; and to present the feasibility of adapting and applying these experiences in other countries.
- Identify key recommendations to be included in the outcome document to be endorsed/adopted by the subsequent SIDS ministerial meeting to scale up action on NCDs and mental health.
You can learn more about the meeting and supporting resources below!
NCDs are the leading cause of death in Solomon Islands. In order to combat this growing issue, WHO supported the country in establishing the SolPEN (Solomon Islands Package of Essential Noncommunicable Disease) programme.
Patients with NCDs are now seen at specialized clinics led by NCD coordinators who work with patients to improve their health from a holistic perspective.
In this video, filmed in Tulagi, an island in Central Province, we hear from Virginia Legaile, an NCD coordinator whose involvement in her community extends outside the clinic office
LAUNCHING A REGIONAL CERVICAL CANCER STRATEGY FOR THE EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN
Cervical cancer is the 6th most common cancer in women in the Eastern Mediterranean Region. In 2020, an estimated 89 800 women were diagnosed with cervical cancer in the Region and more than 47 500 women died from the disease.
January is Cervical Cancer Awareness Month. To mark the month, the WHO Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean (WHO EMRO) has formally launched the Regional Cervical Cancer Elimination Strategy for the Eastern Mediterranean. The event was hosted by WHO leaders, joined by women who have survived cervical cancer, advocates fighting the disease and high-level speakers.
The regional cervical cancer elimination strategy builds on the Global Strategy to Accelerate the Elimination of Cervical Cancer as a Public Health Problem, adopted by WHO Member States in 2020, which proposes: a world where cervical cancer is eliminated; a threshold of 4 per 100 000 women-years for elimination; and the 90-70-90 targets to be met by 2030 for countries to be on the path towards cervical cancer elimination within a few generations.
You can watch the launch of the Regional Cervical Cancer Elimination Strategy for the Eastern Mediterranean here!
WORLD HEARING DAY 2023
World Hearing Day is an annual global advocacy event for raising awareness regarding hearing loss and promoting ear and hearing care, and calling for action to address hearing loss and related issues. Each year, this event is celebrated on 3 March, covering a specific theme on which WHO and its partners carry out activities based on this theme.
This year's theme will highlight the importance of integrating ear and hearing care within primary care, as an essential component of universal health coverage. WHO will also launch a new training manual: Primary ear and hearing care training manual for health workers and general practitioners.
WHO has launched a new site in support of World Hearing Day. You will be able to register World Hearing Day event with the World Health Organization and report on your activities after March 3rd, 2023. In addition, you will find information on the events, promotional, and educational materials for World Hearing Day, including a repository of translated materials.
As part of activities promoting World Hearing Day, WHO, the World Hearing Forum (WHF), and the Coalition for Global Hearing Health (CGHH) invite proposals for WHF-CGHH Small Grants for World Hearing Day 2023. As part of this scheme, partners can apply for a grant of up to USD 800 to cover expenses related to World Hearing Day activities. A maximum of 50 grants will be provided based on recommendations made by a selection panel.
One of the many examples of tobacco control successes in 2022 was an exciting campaign with UNEP to raise awareness on the issue of plastic pollution and cigarette filters. You can watch a summary of the work of the Secretariat of the WHO FCTC in 2022 here.
GLOBAL AND REGIONAL TECHNICAL MEETING ON NCDs IN EMERGENCIES
Last month, key global and regional stakeholders and experts from across WHO, UN agencies, nongovernmental organizations and other entities convened in Cairo, Egypt to address strengthening integration of NCD care in emergency preparedness and response.
Organized by the WHO Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean and WHO headquarters, in collaboration with the Departments of Health Systems and Health Emergencies, this was the first in a series of NCD meetings in the run up to the 4th High-level Meeting of the United Nations General Assembly on the Prevention and Control of NCDs in 2025.
Drawing on the recommendations on how to strengthen the design and implementation of policies to treat people living with NCDs and to prevent and control their risk factors in humanitarian emergencies, adopted during the 75th session of the World Health Assembly, contributing also to the NCD implementation road map 2023–2030, this meeting aimed to build political momentum, and discussed the development of a comprehensive approach to better include NCDs into emergency preparedness and response plans.
On the first day of the meeting, we held a strategic discussion on strengthening integration of NCD care in emergency preparedness, response and recovery. On the second and third days of this meeting, we focused on regional opportunities and challenges of:
- prioritizing key interventions for strengthening integration of NCD care in emergency preparedness, response and recovery;
- lessons learnt from the response to the COVID-19 and other pandemics; and
- country experiences, challenges, opportunities and recommended action stops for strengthening integration of NCD care in emergency preparedness, response and recovery.
To respond to the continuing need during humanitarian crises to treat people for NCDs, WHO has developed and started delivering its first dedicated kits of medicines and equipment for caring for people living with diabetes, hypertension and related conditions.
This video follows the assembly of the kits in the Netherlands and their delivery to southern Turkey, where WHO dispatches the materials to healthcare providers working in Syria to treat people living with NCDs. WHO is also delivering the NCDs emergencies kits to other countries affected by conflicts and natural disasters.
TRAINING JOURNALISTS IN THE IMPORTANCE OF NCDs
How we talk about NCDs matters. Despite having a set of effective, equitable and feasible interventions available to WHO Member States and health providers to prevent and control NCDs, there are still common misconceptions about how we can improve health outcomes, and why doing so benefits individuals, families, communities, economies and the sustainable development agenda.
Recently, a training for media professionals on raising awareness of the importance of health media was held in cooperation with the Jordan Media Institute and the Ministry of Health at the Dead Sea.
This month, the WHO Country Office for Jordan is also hosting an awards ceremony for its ‘NCDs and Media’ competition, which will be held under the generous patronage of Her Royal Highness Princess Rym Ali, in cooperation with the Jordan Media Institute and the Ministry of Health on Wednesday.
This training follows several examples of WHO working with partners to lead journalist training on NCDs, bringing access to the information and tools they need to carry out sensitive, accurate and engaging reporting. You can read more about one example of a recent trainings for the Americas region below!
NCDs, including cancers, diabetes, heart disease and respiratory diseases, account for around 80% of all deaths in the Americas. Last month, PAHO and partners trained 30 journalists, covering topics including where to access data, solutions journalism, story development, reporting without bias or blame, and the importance of reporting on NCDs. Read more about this training here.
As another example of language and NCDs matters, read our recent work surveying more than 900 people with lived experiences of different types of diabetes, providing information about how to communicate accurately, and with impact, and what misconceptions are unhelpful in policy and public discourse.
This study was published by WHO staff, consultants and people living with diabetes on World Diabetes Day 2022, supporting the theme of ‘access to diabetes education’.
UPDATE ON THE SAFER TECHNICAL GUIDANCE
Every 10 seconds a person dies from alcohol-related causes. WHO, in collaboration with international partners, launched the SAFER initiative in 2018. "SAFER" is an acronym for the 5 most cost effective interventions to reduce alcohol related harm.
Last year, the SAFER technical guidance package received WHO planning clearance. The package contains 6 modules to strengthen country-level implementation of the SAFER interventions:
- Developing alcohol control landscape reports;
- Developing SAFER implementation roadmaps;
- Planning SAFER missions;
- Developing alcohol control investment cases;
- Managing conflicts of interest in alcohol control;
- Monitoring SAFER implementation.
The work on the alcohol control investment cases and SAFER monitoring system are in advanced phases. Considerable materials have been collected for finalizing the modules on landscape reports, implementation roadmaps, and SAFER missions. Work on managing conflicts of interest in alcohol control has also continued, including gathering valuable experiences from work in Uganda and Nepal.
This animated video shows solutions to the impact of the harmful use of alcohol through the stories of two fictional countries: one where WHO's Global strategy to reduce the harmful use of alcohol and the SAFER Initiative have been implemented, and one where they have not.
HOUSEKEEPING AND COUNTRY IMPACT
We are aware that the NCD Newsflash is not currently being produced on a weekly basis. The team member who was responsible for preparing the NCD Newsflash has recently begun a new position within WHO HQ.
Please be assured that we eagerly look forward to returning to our weekly schedule as soon as we can, with recruitment ongoing for their replacement.
THE TWEETS WE RETWEET
- Discussions on the prevention, surveillance and management of NCDs in Africa at the 2nd African NCDs Conference (January 2023)
- Coverage of January's #CervicalCancerAwarenessMonth (January 2023)
