Publications

After many years of TB ‘control’ and incremental progress, the TB community is talking about ending the disease, yet this will only be possible with a shift in the way we approach the TB response. While the Asia-Pacific region has the highest TB burden worldwide, it also has the opportunity to lead the quest to end TB by embracing the four areas laid out in this series: using data to target hotspots, initiating active case finding, provisioning preventive TB treatment, and employing a biosocial approach. This paper presents several approaches TB REACH is taking to support its partners in the Asia-Pacific and globally to advance our collective response to end TB.

Public trust in health research needs nurturing. How can epidemiologists help?

Inclusive Decision at Local Level (IDEAL) is a programme implemented by VNG International (VNG-I) which supports local governments in building bridges with all their citizens and allows them to better cope with fragility and its associated risk.

Community-based active case finding (ACF) is needed to reach key/vulnerable populations with limited access to tuberculosis (TB) care. Published reports of ACF interventions in Indonesia are scarce. We conducted an evaluation of a multicomponent community-based ACF intervention as it scaled from one district to nine in Nias and mainland North Sumatra. Community and health system support measures including laboratory strengthening, political advocacy, sputum transport, and community awareness were instituted.

As performance-based financing (PBF) is increasingly implemented across sub-Saharan Africa, some authors have suggested that it could be a ‘stepping stone’ for health-system strengthening and broad health-financing reforms. However, so far, few studies have looked at whether and how PBF is aligned to and integrated with national health-financing strategies, particularly in fragile and conflict-affected settings.

Inclusive Decision at Local Level (IDEAL) is a programme implemented by VNG International (VNG-I) which supports local governments in building bridges with all their citizens and allows them to better cope with fragility and its associated risk.

In Malawi, one of the YES I DO. intervention components is known as the Champions of Change (CoC). The CoC intervention aimed to reduce child marriage and teenage pregnancy in the implementing districts. The intervention focused on addressing gender inequality, one of the root causes of child marriage and teenage pregnancy. This report details the endline study conducted in Machinga district and draws on literature about gender equality in Malawi, details the evaluation methodology, presents the main results and provides general recommendations for policy and practice on gender equality, child marriage and teenage pregnancy in Malawi.

Assessing the completeness of TB notification to determine whether national data truly reflects the real TB situation in selected EU Member states.

Inclusive Decision at Local Level (IDEAL) is a programme implemented by VNG International (VNG-I) which supports local governments in building bridges with all their citizens and allows them to better cope with fragility and its associated risk.

The YES I DO programme found that arranged child marriages are being cancelled in the Bahir Dar Zuria and Kewet woredas, in the Amhara region in Ethiopia, but there was limited evidence about the implications of the cancellations on the lives of adolescent girls.

This brief highlights the main findings of a study conducted within the YES I DO programme that focused on the experiences of adolescents girls who had cancelled their child marriage. It details some key recommendations for policymakers and programme implementers to further support adolescent girls who want to cancel arranged child marriages.

The publication is also available in Amharic, download here.

Access to affordable and reliable financing in agrifood commodity chains is of key importance for all actors along the chain, to use as working capital, and to invest in capital assets. There are a wide range of financing instruments available but these do not always meet the demands of these businesses. Smallholder farmers, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and other vulnerable groups in developing countries are at a particular disadvantage with regard to access to necessary financing services.

An operational qualitative study report as part of the YES I DO programme implemented from 2016 to 2020

Inclusive Decision at Local Level (IDEAL) is a programme implemented by VNG International (VNG-I) which supports local governments in building bridges with all their citizens and allows them to better cope with fragility and its associated risk.

With a wide range of potential benefits – such as improved traceability, food safety, and environmental sustainability, as well as increased farmer income– blockchain has become an increasingly popular technology option for commodity value chains. Yet, there is little knowledge among agri-food professionals of how the technology works, and there is (still) limited evidence of the impact blockchain has on the efficiency, the transparency of transactions, and the costs and benefits this may have for smallholders in particular.