Tracking vaccine scares

LONDON, 14 May 2013 (IRIN Global) - Vaccine scares have emerged as a major challenge to global efforts to eliminate preventable diseases, with rumours and conspiracy theories proliferating faster than health authorities can respond to them. Now researchers, led by Heidi Larson of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, are developing a tool to identify the first signs of these negative reports. full report

Boko Haram attacks hit school attendance in Borno State

KANO, NIGERIA, 14 May 2013 (IRIN Africa) - Around 15,000 children in Borno State, northeastern Nigeria, have stopped attending classes since February 2013, according to a Borno State Ministry of Education official who preferred anonymity, as Boko Haram extremists continue a wave of attacks on state schools. full report

Uganda grapples with paediatric vaccine shortages

KAMPALA, 14 May 2013 (IRIN Africa) - Ugandan children are going unimmunized as the country grapples with persistent and widespread vaccine shortages, the result of insufficient funds and inefficient procurement and supply systems, officials say. full report

Little support, no justice for Mali rape survivors

GAO/BAMAKO, 6 May 2013 (IRIN Africa) - During the rebel takeover of northern Mali in April 2012, many women said they were subjected to rape or sexual assault. Since then, little or no support has come through for these women, say aid workers. full report

Conflict cuts off civilians in DRC's Katanga

KATANGA, 2 May 2013 (IRIN Africa) - Tens of thousands of displaced people in the Democratic Republic of Congo's (DRC) Katanga Province have received little or no humanitarian aid in the months since having fled ongoing conflict. full report

Behaviour change needed to combat malnutrition in Nepal

KATHMANDU, 1 May 2013 (IRIN Asia) - More work is needed to improve nutritional behaviour in Nepal, where nearly half of children under five are chronically malnourished, experts say. full report

Pressure in Philippines to end ban on formula milk aid

COMPOSTELA VALLEY, 30 April 2013 (IRIN Asia) - Health authorities in the Philippines were vigilant in keeping out infant formula donations when Typhoon Bopha hit last December, but activists are concerned the infant formula industry will succeed in pushing through legislative changes that will allow formula donations in future emergencies, making it harder to convince women in those crises to continue exclusive breastfeeding. full report

Smart science in the fight against malaria

NAIROBI, 26 April 2013 (IRIN Global) - Malaria continues to be one of the world’s deadliest diseases, annually infecting more than 200 million people and killing more than 660,000, most of them African children, according to the UN World Health Organization. full report

Building health systems from scratch in Somalia

MOGADISHU, 26 April 2013 (IRIN Africa) - Lul Mohamed, director of the paediatric ward at Banadir Hospital in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, treated five children after two bomb attacks killed 30 people on 14 April. "And they were shooting last night. One died, a bullet in his liver," she said of an eight-year-old boy. full report