Nigeria's polio endgame and a chance to improve struggling routine vaccination services

Kano State in Nigeria has implemented a strategy to increase the likelihood of children receiving necessary vaccinations to reduce cases of polio. The strategy, which included enhanced training on administering the vaccinations, taking the vaccines directly to homes and "collaboration between policy makers and traditional leaders," has resulted in no cases of polio for the last five years.

Three African countries are successfully reducing the transmission of HIV through treatment and education, surpassing many developed countries in reducing cases. Although each is unique, the key lessons include using comprehensive, community-based approaches and strategies that involve collective action.

In the past two years, Zika virus has arisen as one of the most pressing public health concerns. This piece charts the worldwide efforts by doctors using new technology to develop a vaccine for Zika.

Digital public infrastructure is helping African countries build more sustainable health systems by replacing fragmented, donor-funded projects with interoperable digital services. In Zambia, for example, the SmartCare Pro electronic health record system uses thumbprints to identify patients and track chronic diseases like TB and HIV, ensuring continuity of care, where it was historically missing.

The city of Baltimore escaped the worst of COVID-19 with high vaccination rates, high rates of health coverage, and strong support from political leaders who cooperated across ideological lines. Medicaid expansion helped achieve relatively high health insurance rates. Officials were also a bit more and cautious in reopening businesses and schools and relaxing mask requirements. The city didn’t escape the death and illness seen during the pandemic, but for these reasons it fared better than comparable areas.

South Korea has taken a softer approach to preventing and containing the coronavirus, in large part because they’ve prioritized accessible testing and have an already-existing strong and affordable healthcare system. Beyond that, the government has centered on citizen education – sending daily updates about new cases and provided a hotline for questions and concerns.

As more doctors move towards retirement than doctors entering the field, many states are facing the realities of an upcoming shortage. To combat this, Maine is trying to position primary care in rural areas as the backbone of medicine through partnerships that aim to keep doctors in the states.

India was declared polio-free in 2014 after several years of work by health staff who traveled across the country to distribute the vaccine. One key part of the strategy included efforts by the government to recruit and mobilize volunteers from across the country to assist health care workers in locating the children who needed the vaccine and building trust with their caregivers.

In order to reach a pastoralist community with health services, a mobile health clinic called the Kimormor has been deployed in northern Kenya. Treating both people and livestock, the Kimormor has provided family planning, antenatal care, and child health services to this community.

Slow test results make it difficult to stop the spread of tuberculosis. Using faster diagnostic technology and driving vans to rural areas in Tanzania, GeneXpert is making progress in treating this curable disease.