Weekly Highlights, April 12-19

by Alanna Shaikh · 2009-04-19 09:44:00 UTC
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(photo credit: babasteve)

Michael Keizer wrote a very handy three-part post on the jobs in global health that no one talks about, the people behind the screens. These are the folks that keep the commodities flowing and the programs rolling. That includes global health field librarian, lab technician, and security manager. "The superb ones are masters of improvisation, and can work miracles with a piece of string, a paperclip, an old sock, and some of Mama Alphonsine's fufu..."

We launched an initiative this week to collect stories from breastfeeding women around the world. I'm hoping this will teach us how to support each other better, and share what we've learned about infant feeding. It took an experienced friend to teach me how to feed my own son; let's replicate that on a global scale.

Continuing the breastfeeding theme, I went off on a bit of a tirade about breastmilk substitutes in humanitarian emergencies. Just about every major disaster relief agency still distributes powdered milk and baby formula in emergencies, without proper controls. This is dangerous both for infants and for their mothers. We shouldn't support the agencies that do that, and we need to ask them to do better. There are rules on how to distribute formula that actually help people, and we need to make sure that those rules are follower.

Finally, my kid has diarrhea this week, and it's been scaring the heck out of me. It's not a big deal in American kids, but it's a global killer. I've been working in global health too long to shrug it off.

Alanna Shaikh
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