Don Juan is a mythical figure often viewed sympathetically as a harmless and near irresistible babe magnet (think pre-marriage George Clooney, Yanis Varoufakis before the media tore him apart, or Julio Frenk when he was still young and handsome). Sorry to disappoint, you, ladies, but this blog will not be debating Don Juan’s (many) merits and ...

Together, the BRICS countries Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa constitute 25 percent of the world’s GNI, 40 percent of the world’s population and 40 percent of the global burden of disease. BRICS  countries play an increasing role in global health, both by improving health outcomes in their own countries and by engaging in mutu...

As we commemorate the end of the Second World War in Europe and elsewhere, it becomes more and more clear that the Third World War  has indeed started. Not in the way you sometimes read in magazines like Foreign Policy, Foreign Affairs or some other glossy international politics journal, that we’re sort of “sleepwalking” into a new World ...

Use of evidence in decision making is viewed as a crucial step in attainment of good health outcomes. Evidence on the most cost effective interventions exists, but its use in decision making is still suboptimal. Uptake of evidence in public health policy development, also referred to as knowledge translation (KT), is poorly understood, especiall...

Migration is on the rise globally, not only  between low/middle income and high income countries, but also within countries (rural-urban migration). Lately there has even been some migration from developed countries in crisis to former colonies in better shape economically. Currently, a lot of attention is being paid to migrants trying to reach...

Even if you don’t watch ‘The Newsroom’, you know the 24-hour news cycle goes fast. Too fast, more precisely. Last week the boat tragedies in the Mediterranean were on all screens, this week it’s the earthquake in Nepal that is dominating the news (well, there’s still the Greek hero on the beach for the romantic ladies). Both are horrif...

In 1994, 179 UN member countries made a visionary commitment in Cairo at the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD). Amidst sustained advocacy by 30,000 NGO representatives, delegates came to a negotiated consensus that individual health and wellbeing, the protection and promotion of human rights, and the advancement of se...

This morning, as we were gathering for one of our (nowadays rather common) “strategic meetings” at the public health department of  this institute, to “boldly go where synergies can be found and preferably costs can be cut”, at some point my colleague Bruno Marchal made an intervention, in trademark Autobahn way. Bruno has just been app...

  Book Review: African Health Leaders: Making Change and Claiming the Future Oxford University Press; October 28, 2014; 368 pages There have been several complaints about how the story of the response to the Ebola outbreak in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea is being told in the media; about how the stories sometimes do not match reality on the ...