Charles Larson and colleagues find that 23 months into a national campaign to scale up zinc treatment for diarrhea in children under age 5 years, only 10% of children with diarrhea in rural areas and 20%–25% in urban/municipal areas were getting the treatment.

Households seeking help from a health provider overwhelmingly utilize the private sector in Bangladesh. Gender inequities in the utilization of licensed providers and purchase of antibiotics, favouring males were identified. Findings suggest that higher income, urban households tend to practice greater gender discrimination. In order to better understand health dynamics in urban populations, in particular slum-dwellers, there is a need to disaggregate survey data by household location.

To reduce infant mortality through improved family planning, a better understanding of the factors driving contraceptive use and how this decision affects infant survival is needed. Using dynamic panel-data models of infant deaths, birth intervals, and contraceptive use, this study analyzes the causal effects of birth spacing on subsequent infant mortality and of infant mortality on the use of contraceptives and the length of the next birth interval. Data are drawn from the Health and Demographic Surveillance System in Matlab, Bangladesh, where almost 32,000 births have been observed from 1982 to 2005. Our main finding is that complete contraceptive use could reduce infant mortality of birth order two and higher by 7.9 percent. The net effect of complete contraceptive use on the total infant mortality rate is small (2.9 percent), however, because the favorable effect on higher order births is partly offset by the rise in the proportion of high-risk first births.

Summaryobjective To determine the effectiveness of green banana in the home management of acute (<7 days) or prolonged ( ‡7 days) diarrhoea at the community level.methods A cluster randomized field trial was conducted among 2968 Bangladeshi rural children 6-36 months old. Wards (villages) were randomly assigned to either a standard care group or a standard care plus green banana group where mothers were instructed to add cooked green banana to the diets of diarrhoeal children. Through a village-based surveillance system, diarrhoeal morbidity data (severity, duration, compliance) were collected for 14 days. Treatment effects were determined by analysing cumulative probability of cure by testing Cox proportional hazards models and relative risk (RR).results The cumulative probability of cure was significantly (P < 0.001) different in children receiving GB for both acute [hazard ratio ( conclusion A green banana-supplemented diet hastened recovery of acute and prolonged childhood diarrhoea managed at home in rural Bangladesh.

Background: The availability of Antiretroviral Treatment (ART) has changed the course of HIV/AIDS, by transforming it into a chronic condition. However, important challenges remain in the management of HIV/AIDS. These challenges are exacerbated by the fact that in resource limited settings, food insecurity and HIV/AIDS overlap. The aim of our study was to evaluate the effect of a food assistance program on adherence to ART in Sofala province, Mozambique. Methods: In order to assess the effect of the food assistance program on adherence we used propensity score matching with difference in differences estimation. We compared food assistance recipients with controls. We measured adherence based on pill pickup , a pharmacy adherence measure. Results: During the food assistance programme, the adherence of food assistance recipients who received food assistance for a period of six and 12 months and non-food assistance recipients is not significantly different as the average impact is only 0.4% (p=0.94) and-2.3% (p=0.73) respectively. For the period after food assistance had been terminated, adherence is still not significantly different between the two groups, as the average impact is 5.3% (p=0.44) and 1.9% (p=0.65). Conclusion: Our study suggests that food assistance provided to HIV/AIDS patients in Sofala province in Mozambique had no effect on their adherence to ART. Our results indicate that although efforts have been put forth to reduce food insecurity among HIV/AIDS patients, more should be done to ensure that these efforts really result in the improvement of adherence to ART. J o ur nal o f A ID S & Cli n ic a l R es earc h