CNS

[video] Dr Nittaya Phanuphak demands urgent resolution of policy challenges threatening Thai AIDS response

[podcast] Dr Nittaya Phanuphak demands urgent resolution of challenges confronting Thai AIDS response

This podcast features Dr Nittaya Phanuphak, Executive Director of IHRI (Institute of HIV Research and Innovation) who got twice elected to the Governing Council of International AIDS Society (IAS) from Asia Pacific region, and currently serves on the GC IAS too.

She explains in details how community-led interventions that were instrumental in improving access to thousands of people to #PreExposureProphylaxis #PrEP and #PostExposureProphylaxis #PEP, are threatened and disrupted due to recent Government decisions. These recent government decisions also impact access to free HIV testing for all or condoms and other HIV prevention services. Now several groups like APCOM, IHRI, Raks Thai Foundation, Swing Foundation, Rainbow Sky Association of Thailand, FHI 360, MPlus Foundation Chiang Mai, among others are lobbying the Thai government to reverse this policy guideline, and resume and scale up access to HIV prevention and whole range of services which is key to be on track to #endAIDS by 2030.

Listen to this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn, aCast, Podtail, BluBrry, Himalaya, ListenNotes, American Podcasts, CastBox FM, Ivy FM, Player FM, and other podcast streaming platforms.

Although the world gave unprecedented attention to the COVID-19 pandemic, yet it has long ignored paying heed to one of the most widespread violations of human rights globally: sexual and other forms of gender-based violence – a shadow pandemic that has been menacingly lurking since long. May be it is the deep-seated patriarchy and its sinister links with capitalism and religious fundamentalism that prevents us from ending all forms of violence against women and girls, and other people of different gender identities and expressions.

This podcast features Midnight Poonkasetwattana, Executive Director of APCOM who shares insights on the how recent decisions made by Thailand government has disrupted community-led HIV prevention services such as Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) and Post-Exposure Prophylaxis (PEP).

Whither women's reproductive health in Asia Pacific

Healthcare centre in northern Thailand (CNS photo library)

While the world has made many advancements in healthcare, millions of women and girls in low- and low-middle income countries are still far away from having bodily autonomy and are not able to make informed decisions regarding their sexual and reproductive health. Even in countries like Taiwan, Japan, Malaysia, or Thailand where total fertility rate is relatively low, despite such commendable progress, there are challenges yet to be overcome.

This podcast features Massachusetts General Hospital former staff Muffy Lutzin, 77, who has travelled to ~80 countries worldwide - exploring the world as well as exploring her own inner world, challenging her fears and inhibitions, discovering new lights and energies, and connecting with people and to her own self - #hearttoheart - worldwide. She shares her insights of her own #LifeJourney with CNS leader Shobha Shukla on why the only way to live fully is to be #BeYou!

🔶 The Hero Lies In You - a special CNS series - salutes extraordinary lives of living legends around us.

Violence against women and girls is not cultural but criminal

Violence against women and girls remains the most pervasive human rights violation around the world. It manifests itself in many forms: sexual violence, physical violence, emotional and psychological violence, harmful traditional practices, socio-economic violence, and other forms of gender-based violence. Explicit and implicit cultural legitimation for violence against women and girls has to end if we are to deliver on the promise of a socially just and ecologically sustainable world order for everyone.

So goes the theme of this year’s (2022) Universal Health Coverage Day. Air to breathe, water to drink and food to eat are the three basic necessities to sustain life. But the poor quality of any of these can lead to unhealthy outcomes, which we are seeing in today’s world in the form of a plethora of air, water and food borne illnesses. Destruction of biodiversity by humans is also creating conditions that abet the spread of new diseases. Logging, mining, deforestation, road construction, all bring people into closer contact with animal species. Data show that an estimated 75% of the emerging infectious diseases in humans have an animal origin, triggered by viruses or bacteria.

[video] Stronger action against tobacco and NCDs is vital, Han Kosal, Deputy Governor, Kampong Cham, Cambodia

[video] Bogor City Mayor of Indonesia leads from the front to reduce tobacco use, prevent NCDs, TB, COVID-19

Connecting the dots with science: Latent TB, active TB disease, and integrated health and development responses

#OneHealth approach is critical cog-in-the-wheel for reporting on health and development issues

United multisectoral actions to fight drug-resistant TB in Indonesia

Journalistic reporting using #OneHealth approach

[video] Connecting the dots: Disability justice and ending all forms of gender-based violence

[video] Blunting of an epidemic: A courageous war on AIDS

Radio broadcast series on antimicrobial resistance in Thailand: 9 episodes

[video] Vaccine hesitancy and confidence: Insights of scientist Dr R Gangakhedkar on pandemic preparedness

[podcast] Vaccine hesitancy, confidence, and pandemic preparedness: Dr Gangakhedkar's insights

This podcast features noted scientist Dr Raman R Gangakhedkar who shares insights on vaccine hesitancy, vaccine confidence, and range of issues around pandemic preparedness. Among the most distinguished scientists and epidemiologists, Padamshree Dr Raman R Gangakhedkar is in conversation with CNS founder head Shobha Shukla. Dr Gangakhedkar has earlier been the head of epidemiology at Indian Council of Medical Research and among distinguished #HIVScience leaders of ICMR-National AIDS Research Institute, India.

Listen to this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn, aCast, Podtail, BluBrry, Himalaya, ListenNotes, American Podcasts, CastBox FM, Ivy FM, Player FM, and other podcast streaming platforms.

[video] National media workshop in Indonesia: Applying One Health approach in reporting on health issues

[video] Farmers quitting growing tobacco and transitioning to coffee

[video] Farmers quitting growing tobacco and transitioning to sweet potato and cassava

#APCAT2022 Declaration: Is it the clarion call to #endTobacco?

Tobacco use is among the unhealthy behaviours that result in preventable burden of cancers, strokes, and heart diseases, said Budi Gunadi Sadikin, Indonesia’s health minister. In Indonesia tobacco use is the second largest risk factor for untimely deaths, he added. World Health Organization had earlier underlined that without clamping tobacco use, we cannot deliver on the promises enshrined in the Sustainable Development Goals.

Antimicrobials have been widely used to fight diseases, including sexually transmitted infections (STIs), for nearly 80 years. Penicillin, the world’s first antibiotic, was used for the first time to treat and cure syphilis in 1943. However, bacteria that cause STIs have fought back so that many of the antibiotics once used to treat them no longer work, even as STIs continue to cause high rates of infections worldwide.

Do we not dread an unfortunate situation of being infected with an incurable (or difficult to treat) disease? We saw how COVID-19 (to which there is no cure yet) jolted not only the global health security but also economic and social security worldwide.

Pervasive discrimination against LGBTQIA+ people in Indian hospitals

Shobha Shukla, Bobby Ramakant

published in NAM aidsmap, UK

25 November 2022

National media workshop in Indonesia: Applying #OneHealth approach in reporting on health and development issues

(click here to register)

As the world observes the annual World Antimicrobial Awareness Week (WAAW) from November 18 to 24, the spotlight is once again on preventing antimicrobial resistance that is not only devastating human health but also threatening the sustainability of our planet earth. Will we protect the medicines that protect us or lose them, resulting in diseases that become difficult or impossible to treat? "The answer my friend is blowing in the wind" as the legendary lyrics go.

India is a leading consumer of antibiotics and hence also carries a huge burden of drug-resistant pathogens. Between 2000 and 2015, its antibiotic consumption increased by 103%, from 3.2 to 6.5 billion defined daily doses. Not just antibiotic use rose, but also resistance to antibiotics and other antimicrobials. A recent Government of India's Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR)'s report points to a sustained rise in antimicrobial resistance in India, with an increase in the number of drug-resistant pathogens, making certain infections difficult to treat with available medicines or impossible to treat. This trend is a warning bell for all of us to take stringent measures against the irrational and irresponsible use of antimicrobials.

[video] Dr Nittaya Phanuphak demands urgent resolution of policy challenges threatening Thai AIDS response

[podcast] Dr Nittaya Phanuphak demands urgent resolution of challenges confronting Thai AIDS response

Shadow pandemic: Gender-based violence is one of the biggest human rights violations

[podcast] Will Thailand government reverse the decision that disrupted access to HIV prevention services like PrEP?

[video] Will Thailand government #TakeBack policy that has disrupted access to #PrEP?

Whither women's reproductive health in Asia Pacific

[podcast] #HeroLiesInYou | Muffy Lutzin's insights on her life journey to explore the world (and inwards)

[video] #HeroLiesInYou | Globe-trotter Muffy Lutzin shares insights on her life journey