Evidence Aid Newsletter: 26 March 2024
Welcome to Evidence Aid’s March newsletter.
Last Friday, 22 March 2024, was World Water Day. This year on World Water Day, 2.2 billion people—over one-fourth of the world’s population—lacked access to safe drinking water. Water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) infrastructure is evinced to save lives, but such interventions are becoming increasingly challenging to implement and reach the necessary number of people due to conflict, natural disasters, and climate change.
As such, in this week’s newsletter, we turn our attention to several evidence summaries which reveal the ever-traversing nature of WASH and its relationship to health, nutrition, and the environment, among other examples. You can find more WASH evidence summaries by searching here.
Relevant Evidence Aid Summaries
Citation: Momberg DJ, et al. Water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) in sub-Saharan Africa and associations with undernutrition, and governance in children under five years of age: a systematic review. Journal of Developmental Origins of Health and Diseases 2021;12(1):6-33
Malnutrition, environmental conditions, and water, sanitation, and hygiene cannot be separated from the interconnected effects they have on the health, growth, and cognitive development of children. In this systematic review, authors investigated the associations of WASH with nutrition status and governance in children under 5 years old in sub-Saharan Africa. It was found that improved access to water is associated with reduced stunting in children from 1 to 5 years of age. However, gaps remain in areas of childhood undernutrition, specifically the environmental risks in the neonatal and infant periods.
Water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) interventions and health outcomes in humanitarian crises
Citation: Ramesh A, et al. Evidence on the effectiveness of water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) interventions on health outcomes in humanitarian crises: a systematic review. PloS ONE 2015; 10(9): e0124688
In this systematic review, the authors searched for quantitative studies on the effects of WASH interventions on health outcomes during humanitarian crises from 1980 to 2014. They found that point-of-use interventions focused on handwashing and provision of soap directly to households may be the most effective and cost-effective at controlling diarrhea. They also indicated that a comprehensive approach, including behavior change and educational interventions should be considered in hygiene interventions. However, there is a lack of epidemiological evidence on the impact of WASH interventions in humanitarian crises, so their effects on health outcomes are uncertain.
Citation: Szajewska H, et al. Effects of brief exposure to water, breast milk substitutes, or other liquids, on the success and duration of breastfeeding: A systematic review. Acta Paediatrica 2006;95(2):145-52. doi:10.1111/j.1651-2227. 2006.tb02199.x
Breastfeeding carries essential benefits to children in crucial phases of development, allowing children to receive minerals, vitamins, and sometimes even medicine through breastfeeding. This review aimed to evaluate the effects of supplementation during the first days of life on breastfeeding duration and the rates of exclusive breastfeeding. The results indicated brief exposure of breastfed infants to other supplementation noticeably reduces the success and duration of breastfeeding; however, this should be interpreted with caution given the limited amount of evidence.
Conferences and meetings
UK Cochrane Centre: On 14 March, Claire attended the get-together to celebrate three decades of the UK Cochrane Centre and to acknowledge the work that the Centre had done during that time before its closure this month due to the infrastructure funding for evidence synthesis. The Centre was established by Sir Iain Chalmers in 1992, and then led by Professor Mike Clarke and latterly Professor Martin Burton. We would like to thank everyone at the UK Cochrane Centre for the support they have given to Evidence Aid.
Skoll Forum: During the week of 9-12 April, Claire will be in Oxford having meetings with registrants of the Skoll Forum and attending side events. If you will be at this meeting, or will be in Oxford during this time, and would like to connect with Claire, please do get in touch as soon as possible.
Additional Information
Social media: Two of our volunteers (Sebastien Duverseau and Abbie Butler) promote our summaries and the work of Evidence Aid through several social media accounts. Please follow us to continue to stay up to date on our work and share any content you think is useful.
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Commissioned projects: Read more about our ongoing projects here.
Volunteers: Vital to the ongoing work of Evidence Aid, volunteers are the backbone of our organization. From searching, screening, and downloading reviews to preparing and writing summaries, the work of volunteers is apparent in every ounce of material we produce. If you’re interested in joining our team, please email info@evidenceaid.org.
Funding: If you enjoy our work and agree that it’s important that we continue through 2024, please consider donating here. Anybody who hasn’t donated before will have their donations match funded; please do think about this particularly now when your donation will be doubled!
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Thank you for your support and continued reading!
From,
Your Evidence Aid team