Quantifying the burden of injury in ‘data-poor’ setting; a local-need- driven approach?

…global estimation efforts have produced country-specific estimates, stimulated country data hunts that fed data into their machinery and, in a few ‘data-rich’ countries, facilitated full burden of disease and injury assessments too. However, to date, injury burden estimates for the vast majority of ‘data-poor’ countries come from indirect estimation in these global projects. […]

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Botswana reflections: on learning the ABCs

I am currently in Botswana: a landlocked southern-African country of roughly two million people. I grew up here, and it is a place that I consider one of the most beautiful in the world (particularly the Okavango Delta – a bucket list destination for wildlife). The country and its people were beautifully portrayed in this music […]

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Concern for prehospital care/ambulance services

I spent last week travelling in Adjumani district (located in Northern Uganda) as part of an exercise in improving the quality of immunization data through support supervision and mentor-ship. This required us as a team to visit as many of the health facilities in the district as possible. Due to the limited sources of our […]

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More background on our blogging team

Blog 3: So today I wanted to share some more background on our blogging team. As an applied social psychologist, I find this information very interesting indeed! What excites you about being part of the Injury Prevention social media editorial team?   Sheree Bekker: The invaluable conversation that has sprung up around scholarly work through the […]

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World Health Day 2015

In case you didn’t know, today, the 7th of April, is World Health Day 2015. As can be read on the World Health Organization website, WHO hopes to highlight the challenges and opportunities associated with food safety under the slogan “From farm to plate, make food safe.” “Food production has been industrialized and its trade […]

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Proactive rather than ‘The Hindenburg’ response

I had a conversation recently with a colleague who is a tireless worker in the safety of pedestrians, and his comment regarding policy response resonated with me so much that I thought I would share it with you. He likened policy response to road safety to the Hindenburg Disaster of 1937 (see www.airships.net/hindenburge/disaster for more […]

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E-bikes and injury prevention

The ever-problematic struggle between mobility and safety is not exclusive to motorised jurisdictions such as Australia or the United States. Indeed emerging evidence suggests that developing nations are particularly vulnerable as they struggle to develop, implement and enforce road rule strategies to minimise risks to safety whilst maximising the nation’s mobility. Whilst worldwide the demand for […]

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A cell phone app for training road safety skills to Kenyan motorcycle-taxi drivers

Commuters in developing countries often have few choices when it comes to safe travel. The combination of high fuel costs, scarcity of standard vehicles, and inadequate road networks lead to alternative means of transport, which are not necessarily the safest. An example of this is the sprouting of the motorcycle taxis or “Borda-Borda” in Kenyan’s […]

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Malnutrition: Another form of injury that can be prevented

This week my attention was drawn to the Save the Children’s report “Food for Thought: Tackling child malnutrition to unlock potential and boost prosperity” (read more at http://www.savethechildren.org/atf/cf/%7B9def2ebe-10ae-432c-9bd0-df91d2eba74a%7D/FOOD_FOR_THOUGHT.PDF). As I read this report, I had to reassess exactly what I believed injury to be. The most basic definition of injury is damage or harm which is inflicted […]

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