Lao PDR has made notable progress in improving maternal health, with materanal mortality decreasing from 1,600 per 100,000 births in 1990 to 220 in 2013.1 However, in order for further gains to be realized, at least two barriers need to be addressed - the low utilization of maternal health (MH)...

This paper is part of additional efforts supported by the World Bank Global Tobacco Control Program to inform the Government of Vietnam on options for tobacco taxation by providing estimates of the impact of cigarette price increase across five income groups for the period 2020-2022 under two...

Disasters and emergencies often have disproportionate impacts on a country's health system and the overall health of women, men, girls, and boys. The interruptions of routine public health programs, such as vaccination campaigns, are common in the wake of a disaster, setting back gains to...

Smoking is a leading cause of preventable premature deaths. Smoking's effects will continue to devastate lives in many countries, including Ukraine, if measures are not implemented to reduce its prevalence. Smoking is a major cause of many chronic diseases, such as cardiovascular disease,...

Nine out of the world's 10 cities with the worst air pollution are in South Asia. South Asians are exposed to extremely unhealthy levels of ambient air pollution, especially in densely populated, poor locations. The World Health Organization's (WHO) Air Quality Guideline recommends that...

South Asia is home to 9 of the world's 10 cities with the worst air pollution. Concentrations of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) in some of the region's most densely populated and poor areas are up to 20 times higher than what the World Health Organization considers healthy (5 micrograms per...