The East, Central and Southern Africa Health Community (ECSA-HC) is an inter- governmental organisation, which was established to foster regional cooperation to address priority health problems, in order to attain the highest possible standards of health for the people of the region. In pursuit of its mandate, ECSA-HC facilitates the convening of regional meetings namely; the Best Practices Forum (BPF) and the Directors Joint Consultative Committee (DJCC). The aim of the BPF and DJCC meetings is to share best practices and research evidence, identify relevant health policy issues and making recommendations to the Health Ministers Conference, towards the improvement of health programming and outcomes in the region. The upcoming conference will provide a forum for health scientists, policy makers, development partners and other stakeholders in health, food and water and sanitation for health to present their best practices and research evidence that inform policies and programming in the ECSA region. The Conference will be organised in two parts as follows; The Regional Forum on Best Practices from 19 to 20 June 2019 and the Directors Joint Consultative Committee from 21 June 2019. The theme for the 12th BPF is Innovation and Accountability in Health Towards achieving Universal Health Coverage. The theme will be addressed through the following sub-themes: Efforts to improve adolescent and young people’s health; Opportunities for achieving water and sanitation health global target; Equity and access to eye healthcare in the ECSA region; Innovative approaches towards achieving food safety and improving quality of life; Prioritising substance use and mental health challenges in the ECSA Region; Tackling emerging and re-emerging health threats: A regional One Health approach to managing recurrent outbreaks in the region. ECSA-HC invites submission of abstracts for best practices and scientific papers that are relevant to the conference theme or sub themes.
Jobs and Announcements
The 2019 Public Health Association of South Africa conference reflects on the intersections between democracy and health, and the progressive realisation of health care in South Africa. This year’s conference will focus on the status of health care since independence in South Africa and what can be done to move the country closer to achieving the targets of the National Development Plan, achieving equity within universal health coverage and the global Sustainable Developmental Goals by 2030. Through this Conference and its other activities, the Association is working to increase recognition of the importance of maintaining and improving the health of populations by 2030 that is based on the principles of social justice, human rights, equity, evidence-informed policy and practice, and addressing the underlying determinants of health.
This call invites practitioners to submit a completed manuscript to the South African Health Review (SAHR) to apply for the 2019 Emerging Public Health Practitioner Award. The successful candidate will have their paper published in the 2019 edition of the SAHR. The winner will also receive a cash prize and access to wider networks of practising public health practitioners and researchers in the field. Preference will be given to papers that take cognisance of the World Health Organisation’s six building blocks for an effective, efficient and equitable health system. The SAHR aims to advance the sharing of knowledge, to feature critical commentary on policy implementation, and to offer empirical understandings for improving South Africa’s health system. To be eligible for the award, the applicant must be a South African citizen or permanent resident, with a valid South African ID number, currently registered for a Master’s degree in health sciences/medicine or public health at a South African tertiary institution. The applicant must be the sole author of the paper. Any other contributions may only be recognised as acknowledgements. Entries will be assessed by a panel of public health experts. The official prize-giving ceremony will take place at the launch of the 22nd edition of the SAHR.
The Mandela Institute for Development Studies has partnered with the Diamond Empowerment Fund to establish the first in a series of Diamond Empowerment Fund Scholarships. The Fund was inspired by Nelson Mandela who encouraged Diamond Empowerment Fund’s co-founders to tell the world the positive impact Africa’s diamonds were having in building healthy and educated communities on the continent. The Mandela Institute for Development Studies, Diamond Empowerment Fund Scholarship will be earmarked for students from a diamond producing country whose chosen post-graduate study will be in a field that meets the needs for improving the quality of life for Africans. Preference will be given to students who want to gain critical skills in short supply on the continent. Applications are invited from qualifying students in eligible countries, namely Angola, Botswana, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Liberia, Namibia, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Tanzania and Zimbabwe.
This issue of the Bulletin of the World Health Organisation will explore policy options and country experiences on how to expand population coverage, service coverage and financial protection. The editors welcome manuscripts that capture knowledge and experience in addressing bottlenecks and root causes of stagnation that hamper successful UHC advancement. Papers which present an analysis of breakthroughs in health systems that have been conducive to rapid expansion of coverage are encouraged. Papers should focus on, for example, implementation science in health systems, innovative health financing, strategic purchasing, UHC and primary health care, the role of the private sector, policy coherence across government levels (particularly in decentralized health systems), the role of innovative technology and the design and use of health information. Best practices in good governance for health, based on transparency and accountability, would also be useful to learn how vested interests that hamper progress towards UHC are countered in different socioeconomic and political contexts. Comparative cross-country analyses are encouraged.
The Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), with support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York is implementing an African Academic Diaspora Support to African Universities Program. In the early part of 2019, Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa intends to recruit 50 doctoral students in the social science and humanities from accredited public universities in Africa and place them under the College to benefit from the mentorship program. As part of this initiative, CODESRIA intends to recruit 15 senior academics from the Diaspora to complement existing academics who are already serving in the College of Mentors. Selected mentors and mentees will be brought together at a ‘College of mentors’ summer institute scheduled to take place in August 2019. The institute will provide the opportunity for mentors and mentees to get to interact directly learn more about each other’s research interests and get to establish supervisory unions on the basis of shared interests. The call specifically targets senior African Diaspora in the social sciences, humanities and higher education studies based at universities in North America, Europe or Asia. African academics based at universities or other higher education and research institutions in Africa but outside of their own countries may also apply. Mentors will be compensated with a modest honorarium after a midterm review of the project. African academics in the Diaspora wishing to be considered should send detailed current CV’s and a brief note expressing interest to serve in the College.
The special issue will examine emerging new forms of public health activism, and associated novel sources of collective agency, that are evolving in the fight for health-enabling conditions. Attention to structural forms of power, and the strengths and weaknesses of individual agency have long been cornerstones of critical public health, rooted in a long-established structure-agency binary. The editors seek to disrupt this binary by calling for papers that draw attention to alternative, distributed, networked, disruptive, bottom-up sources of agency that characterise emerging new forms of activism. New and resurgent social movements include attention to issues of anti-austerity, disability rights, new feminisms, defence of public services, housing justice, urban regeneration, anti-racism and advocacy targeting commercial determinants of health. Alternative forms of health-enhancing agency and efforts to connect grassroots collective agency to traditional axes of power are emerging. Papers on any of these, or other, locations of collective agency with potential for innovative public health activism would all be suited to the special issue. The editors invite papers from the full range of public health disciplines, exploring the possibilities of public health activism in contemporary conditions, especially papers with strong empirical bases in studies of recent/contemporary activism. Creative responses to crisis are most often generated in practice rather than theory, and papers rooted in activist and collaborative praxis are particularly welcome.
IFRA-Nairobi invites applications for fieldwork grants from Masters and PhD students who conduct research in social sciences and humanities in the East African region (Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda, and Eastern Congo). IFRA will prioritize support to the following research themes: workers, labour, and employment; decolonizing knowledge and practices in the social sciences; and gender & LGBT in words and in practice. These research areas target studies on workers in industries, in factories and on plantations in East Africa, focusing on working conditions, workers relations (considering gendered issues), workers/employers relations, organized protest or consent, the growth of a working class culture, entertainment and reading practices, political consciousness, etc. Both case-study approaches and comparative approaches are welcome. Read more at the website.
Applications are invited for an International Fellowship for early to mid-career urban scholars from the Global South, on any theme pertinent to a better understanding of urban realities in the Global South. The Fellowship covers the costs of a sabbatical period at a university of the candidate’s choice in the Global North or South for the purpose of writing up the candidate’s existing research findings in the form of publishable articles or a book under the guidance of a chosen mentor in their field of study. Funding is available for a period ranging between 3-9 months. Applicants must be early to mid-career urban scholars with a PhD obtained within the preceding 10 years who currently work in a university or other research institution within the Global South. Candidates must also be nationals of a country in the Global South, defined here as countries on the OECD’s current ODA recipient list (2018-2020). Preference may be given to candidates from least or low-income countries but middle-income countries on the list are not excluded if the need for support is justified. The candidate must make suitable arrangements to be mentored by a suitably experienced senior urban scholar at the candidate’s chosen research institution.
The Africa Health Agenda International Conference 2019 (Africa Health 2019) in Kigali, Rwanda is geared to be one of the largest health convenings in Africa, with over 1,500 participants expected. Africa Health 2019 will serve as a platform to foster new ideas and home-grown solutions to the continent’s most pressing health challenges, with a focus on achieving universal health coverage (UHC) in Africa by 2030. The conference will be a key opportunity to map a pathway from commitment to action on UHC and to build momentum among diverse stakeholders, including policymakers, civil society, technical experts, innovators, the private sector, thought leaders, scientists and youth leaders.