Chronic Diseases and Urban Health incorporating the TB case-control platform

Changes in environment, nutrition, infrastructure, and epidemics has had profound impacts on the health of people worldwide. The impact in developing countries is even more pronounced due to lack of adequate health systems.

The TB platform has demonstrated the importance of active cases finding, monitoring, follow up and analysis of exposed contacts on the overall health of the population.

The evolution of the platform to chronic diseases and urban health will allow us to upscale this work and better evaluate the requirements for disease monitoring and prevention in The Gambia.

The Chronic Diseases and Urban Health platform will support the planned work on non-communicable diseases and emerging health risks for the Unit.

Information will be collected on environment, socio-economic status and risk factors related to lifestyle and will therefore work as a ‘targeted’ urban health surveillance system.