BackgroundDespite a substantial reduction in the use of solid fuels worldwide, exposure to household air pollution (HAP) from these for cooking remains leading risk factor global disease burden. Among environmental factors, contribution HAP burden is second only ambient particulate matter pollution. We present updates our modeling methodology as well latest findings on attributable estimates.Me...

BACKGROUND An analysis of NIH funding in 1996 found that the strongest predictor of funding, disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs), explained only 39% of the variance in funding. In 1998, Congress requested that the Institute of Medicine (IOM) evaluate priority-setting criteria for NIH funding; the IOM recommended greater consideration of disease burden. We examined whether the association bet...

INTRODUCTION Literature on influenza focuses on influenza A, despite influenza B having a large public health impact. The Global Influenza B Study aims to collect information on global epidemiology and burden of disease of influenza B since 2000. METHODS Twenty-six countries in the Southern (n = 5) and Northern (n = 7) hemispheres and intertropical belt (n = 14) provided virological and epide...

The Canadian Medical Association’s Healthcare Transformation initiative is an impressive example of the work being done to communicate the importance of the social determinants of health to the Canadian public. The communication element of this work is critical, given widely held beliefs that downplay the importance of the social determinants of health: “Despite much research indicating that hi...

OBJECTIVE To determine the age-weighting preferences of urban Zimbabweans in relation to health care priorities. METHOD A total of 67 randomly selected residents of a high-density area of Harare participated in the study. Participants were asked "person trade-off" questions to determine their preferences in terms of the numbers of people of various ages who would be saved from death and from ...

BACKGROUND The relationship between research funding across therapeutic areas and the burden of disease in Norway has not been investigated. Further, few studies have looked at the association between national research investments and the global disease burden. The aim of the present study was to analyze the correlation between a significant part of Norwegian investment in health research and t...

BACKGROUND WHO's global burden of disease studies, undertaken since 1996, apportion the total global disease burden, measured in disability-adjusted life years (DALYs), to specific diseases and injuries. Recent assessments of the relative burden due to specific environmental risk factors, plus an understanding of the nature of the risk factor, may guide resource allocation in risk factor manage...