Like many others, I enjoyed Sophie Harman’s recent paper on the legitimacy of the Gates foundation in global health governance (GHG). I’m not sure I understood everything (I’m one of these people who see their IQ decrease by at least 1 % with every year that passes, unfortunately), so I won’t attempt a review of the paper here. I hope So...

Over a year ago, I suffered from an unusual fever with severe weight loss. Fifteen days into the fever, desperately despondent and confused about the cause of my ailment, being a medical doctor myself I realised that this was not just any ordinary infection. I consulted a general physician in town and was recommended a thyroid profile test based...

On a warm, sunny Sunday morning I arrived in Antwerp, the second biggest city after Brussels in Belgium and my home to be for the next two months. More specifically, my new “home” is the Institute of Tropical Medicine (ITM). Coincidentally, I arrived on the 31st of July, and Belgium, a country in Europe, not a city as US presidential nominee...

Last week, the Economist spotted a new  political divide, at least in the US and many European countries, between  “open” versus “closed” types, or pro-globalization and anti-globalization politicians (and voters). As the globalization backlash in “rich countries” (in outdated Economist jargon) is now pretty clear for everybody, wi...

Time really flies! It’s already the fifth edition of the Emerging Voices for Global Health (EV4GH) programme – initiated by the Institute of Tropical Medicine Antwerp (ITM) in 2010. And while ITM remains a critical partner, the EV initiative has evolved into a multi-partner venture, steered by the Institute of Public Health (IPH) Bangalore, ...

Last week, Durban (South Africa) was filled with science, activism and policy dialogues around HIV, as expected – after all it was the 21st International AIDS Conference. The focus of this edition, “Access, Equity and Rights” was more than apt. According to Charlize Theron, we live in a world that has all the tools it needs for preventing ...

The phenomenon of a misnomer, whereby a wrong or inaccurate name or designation is assigned or used, has long been known. Well, at least in the medical field. As a person from a tropical country I will not hesitate to use this phenomenon, to start this conversation with the example of malaria. Well, malaria came to be known so because ancient It...

At a time when major discussions on the SDGs are ongoing at the high-level ministerial discussion on the SDGs taking place at the UN this week (as well as other global fora such as AIDS2016 and UNCTAD), researchers Julia Smith, Kent Buse and Case Gordon have published a valuable reflection on the role of civil society in achieving the global goa...

No discussion on HIV/AIDS can be complete without the nitty-gritties of target 3.3 (by 2030, end the epidemics of AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria and neglected tropical diseases and combat hepatitis, water-borne diseases and other communicable diseases) of Sustainable Development Goal 3 which ensures healthy lives and promotes well-being for all age...