Results for Health

Three CoViD-19 testing machines and 2000 test kits are expect to arrive in Tonga later this month, although it is still uncertain how they will get here. Meanwhile, the Health CEO warned against public scaremongering: "When people try to force authorities not to accept donations like PPEs to help us fight CoViD-19, it is like the public forcing someone to use a fork and spoon to fight a lion."

Tonga's Health officials are urging sick people, including Tongans, who are planning to visit Tonga, to stay away while they are ill. The plea comes after a 21-year-old Tongan woman travelled while sick with the flu from Sydney to Tonga on Monday, 2 March, and is now suspected of having COVID-19.

An Otago University study is proposing that malaria in the past may have shaped the genome of Pacific people today, resulting in a genetic predisposition to Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) such as diabetes and gout. The elevated levels of uric acids, which can strengthen the immune response to the mosquito-borne disease are also what causes the inflammatory reactions in gout. “Pacific people have their own genetic variants,” says Dr Ana Gosling.

Seven biomedical engineering students from New Zealand’s University of Canterbury (UC) are spending 10 weeks in Tonga’s hospitals and clinics to repair life-saving medical equipment and to engineer biomedical solutions, as part of a work experience pilot program.

UNICEF is supporting the Government of Samoa to respond to a measles outbreak in the country. The Government of Samoa officially declared a state of emergency on 15 November 2019, four weeks into the continuing measles outbreak with more than 1000 suspected cases so far. The epidemic has claimed the lives of 14 children under-five years old and one adult. Lesser outbreaks are reported in Tonga and Fiji.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) and UNICEF are calling on Pacific communities to vaccinate against measles in response to recent outbreaks of measles in Tonga and Samoa.

The immune system – an intricate network of cells, tissues, and organs – is the human body’s primary mechanism for staying healthy. Decoding it should be central to our efforts to understand and fight illness, whether non-communicable diseases such as cancer, diabetes, and Alzheimer’s, or infectious ones such as tuberculosis, malaria, and Ebola. By fully leveraging the power of our immune systems, we could find new ways to fight disease everywhere. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning will be the keys to this achievement - because of the vast size and complexity of the human immune system. It is billions of times larger than the human genome. By Wayne Koff.

One of the biggest obstacles to reducing the rate of unplanned pregnancies is the lack of sex education in schools. If more teenagers had access to sex education and contraception, fewer girls would have their lives interrupted by pregnancy. Only by empowering women and girls with the resources to control their reproduction will the grim statistics that have long burdened Guyana – and many other countries – begin to change for the better. By Patricee Douglas

Over 30 cases of breast cancer are diagnosed in Tonga every year, Dr Amelia Afuhaamango Tu‘ipulotu told the Tonga Breast Cancer Society this morning, October 1, at the launch of their Pink October breast cancer awareness campaign. “The number may be higher because many women do not come forward,” she said.