Governments around the world could save huge health costs and avert millions of early deaths if they introduced laws to cut salt levels in food.
The internet had a disruptive impact on the handling of the flu pandemic by fanning speculation and rumours, officials said on Tuesday.
Medics in Mogadishu’s hospitals are being overwhelmed by casualties from the fighting in Somalia, the WHO said on Tuesday.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) on Monday conceded shortcomings in its handling of the H1N1 swine flu pandemic.
The World Health Organisation will launch a major campaign on Wednesday to counter a triple threat to health in fast growing cities.
Medical workers are concerned that the lethal combination of HIV infections and tuberculosis may become the world’s next major health crisis.
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/ 4 December 2009
The WHO launched a campaign on Friday to try to stop what could become a health catastrophe caused by rapidly rising levels of smoking in Africa.
The World Health Organisation restated its confidence in the H1N1 flu vaccine on Tuesday, calling it the most important tool against the pandemic.
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/ 18 September 2009
Production of swine flu vaccines will fall ”substantially” short of the amount needed to protect the global population, the WHO warned on Friday.
The global spread of swine flu will endanger more lives as it speeds up in coming months, the World Health Organisation said on Friday.
Procedures to fast-track approvals of new vaccines to combat H1N1 influenza do not reduce safety, the World Health Organisation said on Thursday.
Teaching new mothers how to breastfeed could save 1,3-million children’s lives every year, the WHO said on Friday.
Tanning beds now rank alongside cigarettes and asbestos as a top-level cancer threat, the World Health Organisation’s cancer research agency said.
The WHO said on Tuesday it will consult experts on the way anti-viral drugs such as Tamiflu are used to tackle the swine flu pandemic.
H1N1 pandemic flu has spread to 160 countries and killed about 800 people, and needs to be watched in case it mutates, the WHO said on Friday.
The worldwide death toll from swine flu has doubled in the past month, reaching more than 700 since the start of the outbreak, WHO said on Tuesday.
Three more people were diagnosed with swine flu over the weekend, pushing SA’s number of cases to seven, the Health Department said on Monday.
Authorities appealed for calm on Monday after Britain confirmed the first swine flu death outside the Americas.
The WHO was poised on Thursday to declare that the new H1N1 virus has caused the first influenza pandemic in more than 40 years.
The WHO will on Thursday consult its emergency committee of flu experts, which could recommend the declaration of a swine flu pandemic.
The WHO called a meeting of top world scientists on Friday to assess the swine flu outbreak that has killed 125 and infected about 22 000 people.
Countries should be ready for more serious H1N1 flu infections and more deaths from the newly discovered virus, the WHO said on Friday.
Mexico’s swine flu death toll has risen by four as the virus continues to spread through Latin America and makes inroads in Asia.
The H1N1 flu strain is spreading fast in Japan, the WHO said on Monday, and ministers and top officials in Geneva discussed how to fight pandemic flu.
Japan said on Sunday that 13 more students had tested positive for swine flu, as officials gathered in Geneva for talks on how to contain the virus.
The WHO warned on Friday against a false sense of security from waning and apparently mild outbreaks of H1N1 flu, saying the worst may not be over.
Southern African countries have put a response plan in place to deal with possible swine flu cases, Health Minister Barbara Hogan said on Thursday.
Germany confirmed its first three cases of swine flu on Wednesday, the eighth country where the virus has been found.
The South African government’s ”non-response” to the outbreak of swine flu was worrying, the Democratic Alliance said on Tuesday.
A new virus that has killed 149 people in Mexico was found further around the world on Tuesday and the specter of a pandemic began to hit air travel.
New Zealand and Israel confirmed cases of swine flu on Tuesday, the latest countries hit by a new strain that has killed up to 149 people in Mexico.
South Africans should not panic over swine flu, which is spreading in some parts of the world, the Health Department said on Tuesday.