Sand and dust storms: a growing global health threat calls for international health studies to support policy action.

Sand and dust storms increasingly threaten global environmental and public health. To date, 150 countries are directly affected, with more than 100 classified as non-dust source regions. With climate change, these storms are expected to become more frequent and severe.

Low-Cost Hourly Ambient Black Carbon Measurements at Multiple Cities in Africa.

There is a notable lack of continuous monitoring of air pollutants in the Global South, especially for measuring chemical composition, due to the high cost of regulatory monitors. Using our previously developed low-cost method to quantify black carbon (BC) in fine particulate matter (PM) by analyzing reflected red light from ambient particle deposits on glass fiber filters, we estimated hourly ambient BC concentrations with filter tapes from beta attenuation monitors (BAMs). BC measurements obtained through this method were validated against a reference aethalometer between August 2 and 23, 2023 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, demonstrating a very strong agreement ( = 0.

Effects of Performance-Based Financing on Availability, Quality, and Use of Family Planning Services in the Democratic Republic of Congo: An Impact Evaluation.

Access to high-quality family planning services remains limited in many low- and middle-income countries, resulting in a high burden of unintended pregnancies and adverse health outcomes. We used data from a large randomized controlled trial in the Democratic Republic of Congo to test whether performance-based financing (PBF) can increase the availability, quality, and use of family planning services. Starting at the end of 2016, 30 health zones were randomly assigned to a PBF program, in which health facilities received financing conditional on the quantity and quality of offered services.

Retention and Predictors of Attrition Among People Living With HIV on Antiretroviral Therapy in Guinea: A 13-Year Historical Cohort Study in Nine Large-Volume Sites.

The objective of this study was to estimate the retention rate of patients in an ART program and identify the predictors of attrition. This was a historical cohort study of HIV patients who started ART between September 2007 and April 2020, and were followed up on for at least 6 months in nine large-volume sites. Kaplan Meier techniques were used to estimate cumulative retention and attrition probabilities.

Simulating the impact of varying vegetation on West African monsoon surface fluxes using a regional convection-permitting model.

This study assessed the sensitivity of the West African climate to varying vegetation fractions. The assessment of a such relationship is critical in understanding the interactions between land surface and atmosphere. Two sets of convection-permitting simulations from the UK Met Office Unified Model at 12 km horizontal resolution covering the monsoon period May-September (MJJAS) were used, one with fixed vegetation fraction (MF-V) and the other with time-varying vegetation fraction (MV-V).