SciDev.Net

Mobile phones can improve health services and provide help for displaced patients during political crises, say Richard Lester and Sarah Karanja.

Understanding how neglected tropical diseases affect chronic diseases can help inform health policies, say Peter Hotez and Abdallah Daar.

Many people suffer or die from foodborne disease each year — but how many? Arie Havelaar believes a WHO initiative will find out.

Rising temperatures, which promote algal blooms and the spread of pathogens, are setting a new agenda for microbiologists, says Bernard Dixon.

Funding agencies and donors hoping to tackle malaria must commit more to basic research, says Nature.

China's improved accessibility to HIV/AIDS statistics is a good start to the disease's control in the country, says an editorial in Nature.

A Peruvian clinic's treatment of extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis is an example to the developing world, says Mario C. Raviglione.

Malaria control efforts should be joined with those of neglected tropical diseases to achieve eradication, say Peter J. Hotez and David H. Molyneux.

Multidrug-resistant TB needs more research to equip healthcare workers with the right tools, write Frank G. J. Cobelens and colleagues.

Researchers are putting women's lives at risk by being too cautious about trialling drugs during pregnancy, say Nicholas J. White and colleagues.

Non-communicable disease treatment has a lot to learn from tuberculosis control programmes, say Anthony D. Harries and colleagues.

The UN programme for HIV/AIDS is out of touch with reality and hindering health capacity building, argues Roger England.

Successful vaccination against the main causes of pneumonia will complicate care of remaining cases, say J. Anthony G. Scott and Mike English.

Elimination of blinding trachoma is entirely possible by 2020, says the New England Journal of Medicine.

Malaria policy needs to be changed if WHO targets are to be met, warn Ephantus J. Muturi, Peter Burgess and Robert J. Novak.

Weaknesses in HIV research design have hindered progress in identifying prevention strategies, say Stephen W. Lagakos and Alicia R. Gable.

Peter J. Hotez believes the establishment of a new financing mechanism is vital for the control and eradication of neglected diseases.

Amy C. Morrison and colleagues outline key preventative measures for controlling the Aedes aegypti mosquito that spreads disease.

Reducing antibiotic use is not enough to curb the rise of resistance in the developing world, say Zulfiqar A. Bhutta and Syed Rehan Ali.

Tackling antibiotic resistance requires well-run diagnostic laboratories, says Pradeep Seth.