Malaria control programme performance review (MPR) is an important public health programme management tool for countries striving to strengthen programme structures and systems and capacity to incrementally improve performance to scale up and sustain universal coverage with a mix of key interventions to all malaria risk populations.

The MPR is a periodic joint collaborative high-level programme management process for evaluation of progress and performance of country programmes within the national health and development agenda. The aim of the review/evaluation is to improve the operational performance and the strategic direction for scaling up delivery of mix of anti-malaria interventions in order to reduce malaria morbidity and mortality and overall transmission. The programme performance review helps to build effective and efficient malaria control programmes by identifying major achievements regards outcome and impact, best practices and lessons learnt, critical issues, priority problems, and investigates the causes of the problems and proposes solutions for more effective malaria service delivery. This then allows for programme re-design and strengthening structures, systems and capacity to achieve better performance regards, equity, coverage, quality and impact with service delivery of anti- malaria interventions. 

The MPR process has four distinct phases with several steps and activities: 

• Phase 1. Planning programme review; 
• Phase 2. Internal thematic desk review; 
• Phase 3. Joint programme field review;
• Phase 4. Final report and follow up of recommendations and updating policies, strategic and annual operational plans and programme re-design.

The WHO Malaria performance manual trial edition 2010 provides programmatic management guidance to all countries and Roll Back Malaria partners in planning, implementation and follow-up of malaria program reviews/evaluations. Please contact WHO/GMP in Headquarters or WHO Regional Offices for any questions, comments and feedback. 

Related documents

• National malaria programme reviews

Report of a Technical Consultation on the safety of chlorproguanil–dapsone the treatment uncomplicated falciparum malaria in Africa convened by WHO in Geneva, Switzerland on 1–2 July 2004.

The report aims to set the global agenda on cancer, mobilize stakeholders and help countries set priorities for investing in cancer control and universal health coverage. It introduces the principles, tools and current priority cancer control interventions in the context of the current and future cancer burden and opportunities.

In recent years, the application of nucleic acid amplification (NAA)-based diagnostic tools to detect malaria in the context of epidemiological surveys and in research endeavours has increased significantly. Many different assays are available with a superior diagnostic performance to microscopy and rapid diagnostic tests. Based on a recent evidence review, this document provides a list of six recommendations on the role of molecular diagnostic tests for malaria in low transmission areas.

The Department of Ageing and Life Course (ALC) has developed a toolkit that assists health care workers in being well versed in the diagnosis and management of the chronic diseases and the so-called four giants of geriatrics (memory loss, urinary incontinence, depression and falls/immobility) that often impact people as they age.

The toolkit's purpose is to:

• improve the primary health care response for older persons.
• sensitize and educate primary health care workers about the specific needs of their older clients.
• provide primary care health workers with a set of tools/instruments to assess older people's health.
• raise awareness among primary care health workers of the accumulation of minor/major disabilities experienced by older people.
• provide guidance on how to make primary health care management procedures more responsive to the needs of older people's needs.
• offer direction on how to do environmental audits to test primary health care centres for their age-friendliness.

The toolkit comprises a number of instruments (evaluation forms, slides, figures, graphs, diagrams, scale tables, country guidelines, exam sheets, screening tools, cards, checklists, etc.) that can be used by primary health care workers to assess and address older persons' health. These resources are meant to supplement and not to replace local and national materials and guidelines.

This document describes an approach for conducting a national situational analysis of water, sanitation hygiene (WASH) as a basis for improving quality of care. A situational analysis is the first of the eight “practical steps” recommended by WHO and UNICEF as a means to trigger action to improve and sustain WASH in health care facilities, a prerequisite for providing quality care.

 This document describes the process from the initial preparatory stages, including triggers for action, through data collection and analysis to the dissemination of results. Each element of the approach is described and possible limitations and mechanisms to mitigate these are explored. It is intended for use by national governments, UN organisations and partners wishing to better understand how to conduct a national situation analysis of WASH in health care facilities and quality in order to understand policy gaps, raise awareness of problems, tailor interventions and advocate for additional financing.

In January 2006, on the occasion of the release of the first edition of the Guidelines for the treatment of malaria, WHO issued a press release urging 17 known companies to stop marketing artemisinin monotherapies, and to re-direct their production efforts towards artemisinin-based combination therapies. The press release received major attention in the international media and in the national press in endemic countries. Before the press release was issued, all concerned companies were invited to a technical briefing in Washington, but only two were able to attend. 

In order to share more information with 41 companies active in this sector, a second meeting was scheduled in Geneva in April 2006. Twenty-six pharmaceutical companies involved in production and marketing of artemisinin monotherapies for oral treatment of uncomplicated falciparum malaria attended the WHO Briefing on malaria treatment guidelines and artemisinin monotherapies, held on 19 April 2006 in Executive Board Room, WHO Geneva.

On 26-28 March 2014, the WHO Global Malaria Programme convened a consultation in Geneva, Switzerland to review and update the WHO Malaria microscopy quality assurance manual. The manual was prepared by the WHO Regional Office for the Western Pacific on behalf of the WHO Global Malaria Programme and published in 2009. It was the result of several years of consensus-building among experts in the field of malaria microscopy and quality assurance.

This report is a summary of the discussions held during the consultation. It also provides access to all the presentations that were shared at the meeting. 

Related documents

• Malaria microscopy quality assurance manual – Ver. 2

Mercury is used in gold mining to extract gold from ore by forming “amalgam” – a mixture composed of approximately equal parts mercury and gold. The amalgam is heated, evaporating the mercury from the mixture, leaving the gold. This method of gold extraction is used in the ASGM community because it is cheaper than most alternative methods, can be used by one person independently, and is quick and easy. On a global basis, ASGM is responsible for approximately 37% of mercury emissions and is the largest source of air and water mercury pollution.4 Mercury vapors in the air around amalgam burning sites can be alarmingly high and almost always exceed the WHO limit for public exposure of 1.0 µg/m3 . These exposures affect not only ASGM workers but also those in the communities surrounding the processing centers. The vaporized mercury eventually settles in soil and the sediment of lakes, rivers, bays, and oceans and is transformed by anaerobic organisms into methylmercury. In waterbodies, the methylmercury is absorbed by phytoplankton, ingested by zooplankton and fish thereby contaminating the food chain. It especially accumulates in long-lived predatory species including shark and swordfish.

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This WHO UNFCCC health and climate change country profile for Fiji provides a summary of available evidence on climate hazards, health vulnerabilities, health impacts and progress to date in health sector efforts to realize a climate-resilient health system.

The WHO and UNFCCC Health and Climate Change Country Profile Project monitors the health impacts of climate change and progress in building climate resilient health systems. By publishing updated country profiles every four years, the project not only provides a snapshot on a range of national health and climate change indicators, but also creates a mechanism to track climate-related health impacts and responses over time. During the first cycle of the project in 2015, nearly 50 country profiles were published. The number of country profiles is being significantly expanded in the second cycle, with around 100 country profiles expected to be published by the end of 2021.

The country profiles are developed in close collaboration with regional and country level WHO offices, national health authorities, and health stakeholders. The overall aims of the WHO and UNFCCC Health and Climate Change Country Profile Project are to:

• Increase awareness of the health impacts of climate change
• Support evidence-based decision making to strengthen the resilience of health systems
• Support health involvement in national and international climate processes such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)
• Promote actions that improve health while reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Read More

All Health and Climate Change Country Profile

This document is for humanitarian health actors working at national and sub-national level in countries facing humanitarian emergencies. It applies to Health Cluster partners, including governmental and non-governmental health service providers.

Based on the IASC Guidelines on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Emergency Settings (IASC, 2007), it gives an overview of essential knowledge that humanitarian health actors should have about mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) in humanitarian emergencies.

This document by the IASC Reference Group for Mental Health and Psychosocial Support was developed in consultation with the IASC Global Health Cluster.

parasite transmission occurs even with good access to and usage of LLINs or well-implemented IRS, as well as in situations where LLIN use or IRS are not practical. A combination of human and vector behaviours are responsible for this transmission. 

This guidance note reviews the need for new tools and strategies to address residual transmission, and proposes approaches to accelerate their availability and uptake.

• All MPAC meeting documents, 10–12 September 2014
• All documents on vector control and insecticide resistance

This summary version of the World malaria report 2014 provides an overview of the key points of the report.

Since 2000, the financing and coverage of malaria control programmes has increased remarkably. This has resulted in a wide-scale reduction in malaria incidence and mortality rates. Of 106 countries with ongoing transmission of malaria in 2000, 64 are meeting the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) target of reversing the incidence of malaria. Of these 64 countries, 55 are on track to meet the World Health Assembly and Roll Back Malaria (RBM) targets of reducing malaria case incidence rates by 75% by 2015. Global estimated malaria case incidence rates fell by 30% between 2000 and 2013, while estimated mortality rates fell by 47%.

The background document reviews microbial, chemical and radiological aspects of drinking-water, and addresses the chemical aspects of atrazine toxicity:

• general description;
• environmental levels and human exposure;
• kinetics and metabolism in laboratory animals and humans;
• effects on laboratory animals and in vitro test systems;
• effects on human health;
• practical aspects, and provisional guideline value.

Climate change is likely to have considerable impacts on food safety, both direct and indirect, placing public health at risk. With changing rainfall patterns and increases in extreme weather events and the
annual average temperature we will begin to face the impacts of climate change. These impacts will affect the persistence and occurrence of bacteria, viruses, parasites, harmful algae, fungi and their vectors, and the patterns of their corresponding foodborne diseases and risk of toxic contamination. Alongside these impacts, chemical residues of pesticides and veterinary medicines in plant and animal products will be affected by changes in pest pressure. The risk of food contamination with heavy metals and persistent organic pollutants following changes in crop varieties cultivated, cultivation methods, soils, redistribution of sediments and long-range atmospheric transport, is increased because of climate changes.
Climate sensitive risk factors and illnesses will be among the largest contributors to the global burden of food-related disease and mortality, including under-nutrition, communicable, non-communicable, and diarrheal- and vector borne diseases.
The impact of climate change will not be even across different food systems. Some regions are projected to have an increase in food production; however, generally the projected climate change is foreseen to have a negative impact on food security, especially in developing countries. The effects of climate change on food security and consequently nutrition are closely linked to effects on food safety and public health and must be considered together. WHO, together with agriculture, environment and other relevant sectors must be ready to support national authorities, particularly in developing countries and countries most affected, to prepare and respond to these effects.

• Climate change is expected to lead to modified bacterial, viral and pathogenic
  contamination of water and food by altering the features of survival and transmission patterns through changing weather characteristics, such as temperature and humidity.
• Climate-dependent temperature and moisture, fungal growth and formation of
  mycotoxins will lead to changes in occurrence patterns. Mycotoxins are produced by certain fungi (moulds) on crops and can cause both acute toxic effects and chronic health problems (including cancer) in humans and livestock.
• Climate change has also been described as a ‘catalyst for the global expansion’ of algal blooms in oceans and lakes, interacting with nutrient loading from fertilizer run-off into water bodies.
• This high risk of emerging zoonoses, changes in the survival of pathogens, and alterations of vector-borne diseases and parasites in animals, may necessitate the increased use of veterinary drugs, possibly resulting in increased residue levels of veterinary drugs in foods of animal origin. This poses not only acute and chronic risks to human health, but is directly linked to an increase in antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in human and animal pathogens.
• The application of pesticides, and the subsequent residues in food, is an ongoing concern that is expected to become more prevalent due to climatic changes, with shifts in farming systems and farmers’ behaviour to adapt to the changing climate.
• The increased frequency of inland floods linked to climate change will impact
  environmental contamination and chemical hazards in foods through the remobilisation of contaminated river sediments and subsequent contamination of agricultural and pastureland soil contaminants.
• Climate change increases the frequency and severity of extreme weather events which impacts food security. Where food supplies are insecure, people tend to shift to less healthy diets and consume more “unsafe foods” – in which chemical, microbiological and other hazards pose health risks and which contribute to increased malnutrition.