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Posts Tagged: Rachel Nugent

 

Combating Drug Resistance: Rachel Nugent

April 4, 2011

Posted by in Global Development, Global Health Policy Tags: , , , ,

Rachel Nugent Drug resistance, a neglected but increasingly urgent problem, receives some much-needed attention this week as the focus of this year’s World Health Day, also dubbed Antimicrobial Resistance Day, on Thursday, April 7. I invited Rachel Nugent, lead author of The Race Against Drug Resistance, a CGD working group report, for a progress report on efforts to address this problem since the report was released last June.

We begin with some scary stuff—the continued emergence of “superbugs” that doctors don’t like to talk about, such as hospital-bred pathogens that have become immune to antibiotics, drug resistant malaria, and my favorite nightmare, drug resistant TB, which the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates could infect two million people around the globe by 2015.

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Non-Communicable Diseases a Huge Problem in Developing World, Funding Scant (Interview with Rachel Nugent)

October 31, 2010

Posted by in Global Health Policy Tags: , ,

Rachel NugentHeart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes and cancers are usually considered diseases of the rich world, the result of too much food and too little exercise. But these serious diseases are already a huge problem in the developing world, accounting for about half of the burden of disease. Yet new research from the Center for Global Development has found that barely 3% of foreign aid and philanthropic spending for developing world health addresses these often overlooked diseases.

My guest this week is the lead author of that research, Rachel Nugent, CGD deputy director of global health. In a working paper co-authored with Andrea Feigl – Where Have All the Donors Gone? Scarce Donor Funding for Non-Communicable Diseases – Rachel examines the impact of non-communicable diseases in the developing world and assesses the response of international donors. In the Wonkcast, we discuss her findings and recommendations for addressing this challenge.

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When Medicines Fail: Rachel Nugent on Combating Drug Resistance

June 15, 2010

Posted by in Global Health Policy Tags: , , , ,

Rachel NugentThis week on the Wonkcast, I’m joined by Rachel Nugent, Deputy Director for Global Health here at the Center for Global Development. She is the lead author on a new CGD working group report entitled The Race Against Drug Resistance, which prescribes a global effort to halt and reverse the spread of drug resistant microbes.

In the Wonkcast, Rachel explains that the more people rely on antibiotics and other medicines, the faster disease pathogens adapt and become resistant. In rich countries, a resistant strain of staph now kills thousands per year– most from hospital-acquired infections. The situation is more dire in the developing world. Rachel tells me that there is only one effective treatment remaining for malaria, and that some strains of tuberculosis are now completely untreatable.

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Population, Poverty, and Economic Growth

February 2, 2010

Posted by in Economic Growth, Inequality, Population and Development Tags: , , , ,

Rachel NugentMy guest this week is Rachel Nugent, deputy director for global health here at the Center for Global Development. Rachel directs the Center’s work looking at the links between population, poverty, and economic growth and serves as the coordinator of the Population and Poverty Research Network, which held its fourth annual conference recently in Cape Town, South Africa.

Many of us are familiar with how development influences population growth: as incomes rise, fertility rates and average family size tend to fall; populations grow more slowly. Rachel explains that while this relationship is important there are many important unanswered questions about how population policies affect development outcomes. For example: if a poor country slows population growth by actively encouraging family planning, will the families involved and the nation reap economic benefits? Under what circumstances?

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