GEGA Activities

GEGA has received confirmation of funding from the Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA) for the period 1 September 2002 to 31 December 2004. This award was made based on the grant proposal submitted last month by GEGA, and will be used to support organizational activities and goals. Congratulations to all those who worked on the proposal!

Internal developments

Consequent to the Coordinator's visit to Burkina Faso, a report of the Ouagadougou Gauge is available at www.gega.org.za/download/newsvol1_2/ouagadougou_rep.doc. The GEGA Coordinator, Lexi Bambas, is completing reports on her visits to the Chile and Ecuador Gauges. In July and early August, Lexi was also able to visit the Zimbabwe, South Africa, Zambia, Nairobi, and Uganda Gauges. The reports will be available next month.

The Secretariat is also investigating opportunities to support training and tools for GIS and visual translation of data using RAHEST. If you have experience that you would like to share using these tools, or if would like to comment on whether you think these tools would be useful for GEGA and the Gauges, please contact the secretariat.

External relations

HST, in cooperation with GEGA and EquiNet, is developing a proposal to host the 2004 meeting of ISEqH (International Society for Equity and Health) in Durban, South Africa.

Identification of Global Network partners for GEGA. If you know of non-GEGA individuals who would like to keep up with GEGA's activities and would be active network members, please have them send a request to the secretariat to be on GEGA's Network listserve.

Recent Gauge activities
The Nairobi Urban Health Equity Gauge (NUHEG) organized a Consensus Building Seminar, "Urban Health Inequities in Nairobi: A Call for Action", at Teleposta Towers, Nairobi, June 20th 2002, in coordination with African Population and Health Research Centre (APHRC), Urban Slums Development Project of the Nairobi City Council (USDP/NCC), and National Council for Population and Development (NCPD). The agenda can be found at http://www.gega.org.za/download/nuhegseminar.zip
August 12-17: Seminar on Inequities in Health, Ecuador Gauge. Program: http://www.gega.org.za/download/Ec1208spanish.doc

Other activities of interest
The World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) will be held in Johannesburg, South Africa, from 26th August to 4th September 2002. The official webpage for WSSD is at http://www.johannesburgsummit.org/, and the webpage for the Civil Society initiative can be found at http://www.worldsummit.org.za/.

The Alliance to Promote Health Equity in Peru (AES) initiated by el Grupo de Análisis para el Desarrollo (GRADE), el Centro de Investigación de la Universidad del Pacífico (CIUP) and la Facultad de Salud Pública y Administración de la Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, is organizing the first international conference Promoting Health Equity in Peru on August 22, 2002. Local and international experts on the fields of equity and health will participate in the conference and we are inviting government officials, development practitioners, academic leaders and community representatives. The conference agenda is available at www.grade.org.pe/eventos/alianza_equidad. Martin Valdivia, who was a technical resource participant at the Uganda GEGA meeting, is organizing this effort. We wish him the best!

The Global Forum for Health Research, which aims to close the 10/90 gap (only 10% of research funding is targeted to diseases that affect 90% of the population) is having their annual meeting November 12-15 in Tanzania. Their website can be found at www.globalforumhealth.org.

GIS Conference. GeoHealth 2002 Conference in Wellington, New Zealand, from 3-5 December, 2002. The conference "aims to forge closer links between the academics/practitioners using Geographical Information Systems (and related technologies) and the health policy-makers. The focus is on better decision-making." www.geohealth.org.nz

Resources, documents, and websites related to equity

The GEGA website has recently been updated and expanded. Of note are the "About GEGA" page and an extensive collection of useful links. If you have other links that should be included, please send them to secretariat@gega.org.za.

EquiNet, an organization focused on health equity issues in Southern Africa, has an excellent reputation for research. Their webpage includes documents from their policy series, a bibliography, and recent news. It can be found at http://www.equinetafrica.org.

The Chile Gauge's webpage can be found at http://www.equidadchile.cl. The page is in Spanish, and includes an interactive forum, information on the Gauge work and on seminars and publications.

Norberto Dachs' and Martin Valdivia's presentations from the GEGA meeting in Entebbe, Uganda on measuring and monitoring are available on-line. [www.gega.org.za/download/newsvol1_2/valdivia.ppt]

A special issue of the PAHO journal on health equity is out. The table of contents and the abstracts are available online at: http://publications.paho.org/english/backissues/backissues.cfm?Product_ID=658

The Journal of Health, Population, and Nutrition is freely available through the Internet (http://www.icddrb.org/jhpn).

"Producing an Improved Geographic Profile of Poverty Methodology and Evidence from Three Developing Countries" (Ecuador, Madagascar, and South Africa). "The methodology estimates poverty at levels of disaggregation that to date have not generally been available by combining household survey data with population census data, imputing into the latter a measure of per capita consumption from the former." [www.gega.org.za/download/newsvol1_2/profileofpoverty.doc]

"Do Budgets Really Matter? Evidence from Public Spending on Education and Health in Uganda". Full text available at: [www.gega.org.za/download/newsvol1_2/budgetuganda.pdf]

On-line seminars sponsored by the Academy for Health Services Research and Health Policy. Topics include Cost-Effectiveness, Hierarchical Modeling; Quality Measures; and a Qualitative Methods series, which includes Interviews, Focus Groups, and Data Analysis. The seminars cost about US$ 175 each. For more information, visit www.academyhealth.org/cyberseminars/live.

Equity Publishing opportunities

Abbas Bhuiya of the Bangladesh Gauge will be the guest editor for a health equity edition of the Journal of Health, Population and Nutrition (JHPN). Manuscripts may include "original research articles on concepts, measurement and other methodological issues, empirical findings on the situation of health equity, and interventions to reduce health inequity. Reports on global, national, or sub-national pro-equity activities and the experiences gained by way of impact and the process of implementation are also of interest." Manuscripts are due September 30, and intent to submit a manuscript is appreciated as soon as possible to jhpn@icddrb.org. Information for Contributors can be seen at or downloaded from the website of the Journal (http://www.icddrb.org/jhpn). For any further information or queries, please contact Abbas Bhuiya at abbas@icddrb.org.

Funding opportunities

The Canadian Institutes of Health Research have several new funding opportunities to promote partnership development, including grants on Global Health Research Program Development and Planning [http://www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/services/funding/institutes/rfa_global_e.shtml]; Reducing Health Disparities and Promoting Equity for Vulnerable Populations [http://www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/services/funding/institutes/rfa_disparities_e.shtml]; and Knowledge Translation Strategies for Health Research [http://www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/services/funding/institutes/rfa_kts_e.shtml] . Please note that the deadline for submitting an intent to apply is Sept 1, with a deadline for full proposals on Oct 1. If you would like more information, or would like to discuss ideas/plans with GEGA, please contact the Secretariat.

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