Tropical

Summary: Background: Severe malaria is a major cause of childhood death and often the main reason for paediatric hospital admission in sub-Saharan Africa. Quinine is still the established treatment of choice, although evidence from Asia suggests…

Neglected tropical diseases are widespread, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, affecting over 2 billion individuals. Control of these diseases has gathered pace in recent years, with increased levels of funding from a number of governmental or…

Guidelines for the management of adults with hospital-acquired, ventilator-associated, and healthcare-associated pneumonia. (2005). American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, 171(4), 388-416. Retrieved from…

The 2009 World Malaria Report summarizes information received from 108 malaria endemic countries and other sources and updates the analysis presented in the 2008 Report. It highlights progress made in meeting the World Health Assembly (WHA) targets…

Chagas disease is the clinical condition triggered by infection with the protozoan Trypanosoma cruzi. The infection is transmitted by triatomine insects while blood feeding on a human host. Field studies predict that one third of an estimated 18…

Plasmodium vivax is geographically the most widely distributed cause of malaria in people, with up to 2.5 billion people at risk and an estimated 80 million to 300 million clinical cases every year-including severe disease and death. Despite this…

People in the bottom billion are the poorest in the world; they are often subsistence farmers, who essentially live on no money and are stuck in a poverty trap of disease, conflict, and no education. 1 , 2 One of the most potent reinforcements of…

Discovered in 1909, Chagas disease was progressively shown to be widespread throughout Latin America, affecting millions of rural people with a high impact on morbidity and mortality. With no vaccine or specific treatment available for large-scale…

Although many examples of highly cost-effective interventions to control neglected tropical diseases exist, our understanding of the full economic effect that these diseases have on individuals, households, and nations needs to be improved to target…

Chagas' disease, caused by Trypanosoma cruzi, is an important cause of morbidity in many countries in Latin America. The important modes of transmission are by the bite of the reduviid bug and blood transfusion. The organism exists in three…

Neglected tropical diseases represent one of the most serious burdens to public health. Many can be treated cost-effectively, yet they have been largely ignored on the global health policy agenda until recently. In this first paper in the Series we…

Artemisinin-based combination treatments (ACTs) are now generally accepted as the best treatments for uncomplicated falciparum malaria. They are rapidly and reliably effective. Efficacy is determined by the drug partnering the artemisinin derivative…

Although progress has been made in the fight against neglected tropical diseases, current financial resources and global political commitments are insufficient to reach the World Health Assembly's ambitious goals. Increased efforts are needed to…

This report makes recommendations on new therapeutic regimens for visceral and cutaneous leishmaniasis, on the use of rapid diagnostic tests, details on the management of Leishmania-HIV coinfection and consideration of social factors and climate…

Anders Bjorkman and colleagues report results from a cross-over trial evaluating rapid diagnostic testing for malaria diagnosis in Zanzibar.

The burden of Plasmodium vivax infections has been underappreciated, especially in southeast Asia where chloroquine resistant strains have emerged. Our aim was to compare the safety and efficacy of dihydroartemisinin-piperaquine with that of…

Background: Migration of Latin Americans to the USA, Canada and Europe has modified Chagas disease distribution, but data on imported cases and on risks of local transmission remain scarce. We assessed the prevalence and risk factors for Chagas…

BACKGROUND: Up-to-date information on the causes of child deaths is crucial to guide global efforts to improve child survival. We report new estimates for 2008 of the major causes of death in children younger than 5 years. METHODS: We used…

During the past decade, renewed global and national efforts to combat malaria have led to ambitious goals. We aimed to provide an accurate assessment of the levels and time trends in malaria mortality to aid assessment of progress towards these…

The success of the sterile insect technique (SIT) and other genetic strategies designed to eliminate large populations of insects relies on the efficient inundative releases of competitive, sterile males into the natural habitat of the target…