BACKGROUND Poor housing is widely cited as an important determinant of the poor health status of Aboriginal Australians, as for indigenous peoples in other wealthy nations with histories of colonisation such as Canada, the United States of America and New Zealand. While the majority of Aboriginal Australians live in urban areas, most research into housing and its relationship with health has be...

The micro-fungal flora of heavy metals contaminated peri-urban agricultural fields of Pakistan were investigated in terms of their diversity by soil serial dilution method. A total of 30 micro-fungi were isolated from 6 sampling sites. Of these isolates 24 belong to phylum Ascomycota, 3 to phylum Zygomycota, 2 to phylum Basidiomycota and 1 to phylum Deuteromycota. The most widespread genus was ...

BACKGROUND In sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), the rising prevalence of overweight, obesity and non-communicable diseases co-exists with the high burden of under-nutrition. The paucity of data on adulthood overweight and obesity, disaggregated by socio-demographic characteristics and in rural settings in SSA calls for research. We determined the prevalence of underweight, overweight/obesity and associ...

BACKGROUND Asthma is a growing public health problem in developing countries. However, few studies have studied the role of urbanisation in this phenomenon. It was hypothesised that children living in a peri-urban setting in Peru have higher rates of asthma and allergy than rural counterparts. METHODS 1441 adolescents aged 13-15 years were enrolled from two settings: a peri-urban shanty town ...

OBJECTIVE To investigate and compare determinates for delayed first presentation to antenatal care (ANC) services. METHODS A cross-sectional study was conducted amongst pregnant women attending their first ANC visit in rural Capricorn District and peri-urban Tlokwe sub-district communities in South Africa. Data collection included questionnaires and medical record abstraction. Bivariate and m...

Urban development process can be considered as a system with its stakeholders falling under categories of Public, Private and People. This approach is called Public-Private-People Partnership (4P) and it has been successfully used in housing development. Between the stakeholders there are several kinds of relationships already recognised, but the field is by no means studied thoroughly. This pa...

The question of urban informality today concerns the majority of the inhabitants and policy makers of regional metropolises, as well as those of secondary cities. This study aims to show that there are diverse mechanisms behind the complexity of urban housing informality in Egyptian cities. It develops a typology of informal housing and estimates quantities and values of different types of info...

This paper describes the new policy on urban development and housing which the Malian government launched after its transition to democracy in 1991 and discusses its effectiveness in reaching low-income groups in Bamako. After outlining Bamako’s growth and housing situation, and the 1991 political transition, the paper describes the new housing policy, formally adopted in 1995. The policy’s sta...

Campylobacter is a leading cause of diarrhoea, and its presence in chickens is a significant risk for zoonotic infection. Poultry production is becoming increasingly intensive in Ethiopia and is incorporating more high-producing breeds into traditionally managed smallholdings, especially in peri-urban areas. This cross-sectional study sampled 219 household environments in one peri-urban and two...