Global Health Security: Blog Posts

Frontline Health Workers Call for Improved WASH to Fight COVID-19

October 07, 2020
{As an HIV-positive woman with an HIV-negative husband and three HIV-negative sons, Margaret’s a role model for how women with HIV can thrive with access to essential services and information. Photo by Patrick Meinhardt for IntraHealth International.}

Health workers not only need water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) services to prevent the spread of COVID-19 right now but also to provide safe essential health services every day. But 25% of health facilities around the world lack basic water services. One in six facilities doesn’t have hand hygiene services, such as soap and water or alcohol-based hand rub, available at points of care. And health workers in facilities in sub-Saharan Africa face even greater WASH challenges.Two frontline health workers—Margaret Odera and Dr. Ann Phoya—recently called for improved WASH services during an event alongside the 75th United Nations General Assembly. Read on to find out what it’s like to be a health worker on the frontlines without WASH and the steps they are taking to access and improve WASH in Kenya and Malawi.

A brutal wake-up call: Access to safe COVID-19 medical products requires stronger regulatory systems

August 03, 2020
[A health worker administers a COVID-19 test in Antananarivo, Madagascar. Photo credit: Misa Rahantason/MSH]

Originally published in Think Global HealthAs COVID-19 spreads across the world, falsified medicines for the novel coronavirus are leaking into Africa