The World Health Organization’s Regional Director for Africa, Dr Matshidiso Moeti has underscored the importance of strengthening health services to tackle rheumatic heart disease (RHD), a neglected and preventable disease in children. She made the remarks whilst addressing participants at a seminar on Rheumatic Heart Disease in Adolescents organized by the World Heart Federation on the sidelines of the World Health Assembly in Geneva.

9 August 2012 -- About 41% of pregnant women in Swaziland are infected with HIV, and they give birth to over 17 000 babies who are exposed to HIV. The prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV is a top priority for the Government of Swaziland.

The awareness of early signs and symptoms for cancer types such as skin, cervical, breast, colorectal and oral in order to get them diagnosed and treated at early stage is important.

Some warning signs of cancer are below:

Lilongwe, 29 March 2007 -- Strategic collaboration among health practitioners is pivotal if southern African countries are to make significant headway in combating the region’s most daunting health challenges - Tuberculosis, Malaria and HIV and AIDS. According to World Health Organization’s Regional Director for Africa, Dr. Luís Gomes Sambo, the region must work together to exchange experiences and increase epidemic surveillance and response.

Johannesburg, 11 August 2009 -- The emergence of the Influenza A (H1N1) 2009 Pandemic puts an additional pressure on health systems of African countries already stretched with other competing public health priorities, said Dr Luis Gomes Sambo, the World Health Organization's (WHO) Regional Director for Africa.

29 SEPTEMBER 2016 | GENEVA - New analysis by WHO shows that negative or ageist attitudes towards older people are widespread. They also negatively affect older people’s physical and mental health.

Fully 60% of respondents in the "World Values Survey" analysed by WHO reported that older people are not respected. More than 83 000 people in 57 countries took part in the survey which assessed attitudes to older people across all age groups.* The lowest levels of respect were reported in high income countries.

Polio eradication remains one of the top priorities for WHO in the African Region. Efforts to eradicate polio began in 1988 with the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI). At that time, polio paralyzed nearly 1000 children every day. As a result of massive efforts from national governments, coupled with significant technical and financial support of international partners, wild poliovirus (WPV) cases have fallen by 99%. At the end 2011, the total number of reported WPV cases was half of that reported in 2010, with 54% recorded in the African Region.

Health Ministers from ten southern African countries and senior officials of the World Health Organization meet from 26 - 28 August in Harare, Zimbabwe, to examine the response of the health sector to the acute and large-scale humanitarian crisis facing the region.

19 Country Synchronized Polio Campaign

Joint GPEI / IFRC Factsheet – March 2010

Malabo (Equatorial Guinea) 31 August 2010 – WHO Regional Director for Africa, Dr Luis Sambo, has urged countries in the Region to take concrete steps to check the emergence and spread of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR – TB) and extensively resistant TB (XDR-TB), high priority TB complications which continue to pose serious health threats to people in the African Region.