Non-fatal outcomes of disease and injury increasingly detract from the ability of the world’s population to live in full health, a trend largely attributable to an epidemiological transition in many countries from causes aff ecting children, to non-communicable diseases (NCDs) more common in adults. For the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2015 (GBD 2015), we estimated the incidence, prevalence, and years lived with disability for diseases and injuries at the global, regional, and national scale over the period of 1990 to 2015.

The Community Directed Intervention (CDI) strategy has been used to conduct various health interventions in Africa, including control of Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs). Although the CDI approach has shown good results in the control of onchocerciasis and lymphatic filariasis with respect to treatment coverage using community drug distributors, its utility in the control of schistosomiasis among urban poor is yet to be established.

A considerable amount of disease is transmitted from animals to humans and many of these zoonoses are neglected tropical diseases. As outbreaks of SARS, avian influenza and Ebola have demonstrated, however, zoonotic diseases are serious threats to global public health and are not just problems confined to remote regions. There are two fundamental, and poorly studied, stages of zoonotic disease emergence: ‘spillover’, i.e. transmission of pathogens from animals to humans, and ‘stuttering transmission’, i.e.

Recent findings of paradoxically high endemicity of neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) among populations living in the Group of 20 (G20) countries could portend high rates of these diseases among patients with underlying non-communicable diseases (NCDs), with resultant co-morbidities.

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Leprosy is the complex disease manifestation of Mycobacterium leprae infection. Although prevalence has declined from 5.2 million globally in the 1980s, new annual case detection rates (CDRs) remain high, at more than 200,000 new cases per year, indicating that additional leprosy control strategies are required to halt transmission.

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Dengue is the most common arbovirus infection globally, but its burden is poorly quantified. We estimated dengue mortality, incidence, and burden for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2013. The researchers modelled mortality from vital registration, verbal autopsy, and surveillance data using the Cause of Death Ensemble Modelling tool. We modelled incidence from officially reported cases, and adjusted our raw estimates for under-reporting based on published estimates of expansion factors.

Achieving target coverage levels for mass drug administration (MDA) is essential to elimination and control efforts for several neglected tropical diseases (NTD). To ensure program goals are met, coverage reported by drug distributors may be validated through household coverage surveys that rely on respondent recall. This is the first study to assess accuracy in such surveys.

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