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A common condition

This series draws attention to the immediate and long term dangers that non-communicable diseases – including heart and respiratory diseases, cancers, and diabetes – pose to individuals living in the developing world

  • Dr Githinji Gitahi, group CEO of Amref Health Africa, on stage speaking at the Global NCD Alliance Forum in Kigail, Rwanda in February 2025.

    Africa’s medical system risks ‘collapse in next few years’, warns health leader

    Focusing foreign aid on infectious diseases has allowed a rise in cancer and diabetes that African governments don’t have resources to fight, says Dr Githinji Gitahi
  • Montage of antivenom vials, hands in protective gloves and snakes

    ‘It’s a cowboy show out there’: the deadly lottery of the snakebite antivenom industry

    Investigation reveals ineffective products being sold across Africa, with poor regulation and shortage of effective medication leading to needless deaths
  • A view from the knees down of patients queuing to see a doctor at a psychiatric centre in one of Nairobi's shantytowns

    Kenya court rules that criminalising attempted suicide is unconstitutional

    The judgment has been welcomed as an important shift in perceptions by human rights and mental health groups
  • An elderly woman in a wheelchair being pushed by a carer through a tropical garden

    Breakthrough drugs herald ‘new era’ in battle against dementia, experts predict

    Medical advances make pills to treat Alzheimer’s disease viable, though challenges remain in sharing gains globally
  • cans of soft drinks in a fridge

    Sugary drinks linked to millions of new diabetes and heart disease cases – study

    Tufts University analysis highlights rise in global health inequalities, with fastest growth in linked diseases in Africa
  • A twisted worm, stained purple, on a slide

    Growth the size of a melon: a scrotum-swelling disease threatening thousands

    Efforts to eradicate the disfiguring mosquito-borne infection lymphatic filariasis are advancing, but it is still rife in 51 countries
  • A doctor places a stethoscope on the back of a small boy

    Millions of teenagers in Africa have undiagnosed asthma – study

    Rapid urbanisation thought to be damaging adolescent health, as researchers say need for medication and diagnostic tests is urgent
  • A woman wearing a face mask and a white laboratory coat holds up two pipettes as another researcher looks on

    Healthier rice variety could counter rise in diabetes, Philippine scientists say

    Researchers develop grain with lower glycaemic index and more protein that ‘could have big impact in Asia and Africa’
  • A man seen from above, eating a bowl of instant noodles at a rough table covered with sackcloth

    Time for a noodle tax? Doctor who sounded alarm on ultra-processed food urges tougher action

    Carlos Monteiro says the links between UPF and obesity, diabetes and even mental ill health are so strong that manufacturers should face taxes just like tobacco firms
  • A medical worker guides a patient as they walk in a hospital ward

    double quotation markAs a cancer care expert, my fears over my own diagnosis run deeper than just curing the disease

    Jeff Dunn
    My treatment for aggressive lymphoma has been successful but severely weakened my immune system. Like many others, antimicrobial resistance could kill me, even if the cancer itself is survivable
  • Four Mongolian women look unsmiling to camera.

    Cabbage and potatoes are not the only vegetables: can these female farmers persuade Mongolia to change its diet?

    In a country where nearly a third of under-fives are anaemic, a lack of vegetables has contributed to poor health and high cancer rates. Now that’s beginning to change as tomatoes, cucumber and celery are cultivated
  • 2024 оны нэгдүгээр сарын 4. Хавдарын үндэсний төв. ГЭРЭЛ ЗУРГИЙГ Б.БЯМБА-ОЧИР/MPA Image from an interview at the National Cancer Center, Mongolia

    Mongolia’s ambitious programme to tackle cancer death rates reaches 40% of population

    Screening project aims to reduce highest cancer mortality rate in the world, but nomadic way of life means many in rural areas are unaware of services
  • Sad young African man thinking and looking depressed

    Campaign to decriminalise suicide in four Caribbean nations gains momentum

    New coalition formed to push for repeal of colonial-era laws and reduce barriers to access for those seeking mental health help
  • Portrait of a black woman sitting in a chair next to a computer with a screensaver reading: 'Brain Health Initiative Nigeria'

    ‘They wanted her to confess to witchcraft’: ending the chilling effects of dementia stigma in Nigeria

  • Elizabeth Odondi standing by a bridge in a garden

    I told my high school friend we’d battle sickle cell together. But she didn’t make it past 18

  • The Food Security and Agriculture Cluster team team distributes dry food rations. April 2023

    ‘There was no other option’: the aid packages feeding diabetes and heart disease in the Pacific islands

    Increasingly frequent natural disasters leave islanders reliant on processed foods for months on end – with deeply concerning knock-on effects to health
  • Sayed Ahmed with his arm around his wife Amena Khatun by the Rupsha River in Khulna, Bangladesh

    ‘It’s in our rivers and in our cups. There’s no escape’: the deadly spread of salt water in Bangladesh

    Kidney disease is on the rise in coastal communities, where some have no choice but to drink and cook with contaminated water
  • A woman seen in silhouette with a cigarette in front of the Philip Morris International logo

    Experts condemn US tobacco firm’s sponsorship of doctor training as ‘grotesque’

    Philip Morris International has supported non-smoking programmes around the world ‘to advance its own interests’, say health professionals
  • Large electricity generators, fuelled by diesel, in the streets of Beirut, Lebanon.

    ‘Where can you hide from pollution?’: cancer rises 30% in Beirut as diesel generators poison city

    Lebanon’s economy and electricity system are broken and much power is now generated locally, with devastating effects on air quality and health
  • The message 'end epilepsy stigma' is seen written on seven hands joined together

    The ‘epilepsy warriors’ breaking down the barriers in Cameroon

    Amid alarming rates of the illness, many living with it are seen as cursed. Now these myths are being challenged
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