Deadline June 2, 2014. Visa and Nethope Innovation Grants

http://nethope.org/assets/uploads/20140507_Visa_Innovation_Grants_2014_RFP.pdf

NETHOPE & VISA TO AWARD INNOVATION GRANTS TO NON-PROFIT AND DEVELOPMENT ORGANIZATIONS 

Visa Innovation Grants 2014

OVERVIEW

Each year, the development community, relief organizations and governments make billions of dollars in cash payments to poor households through benefit stipends, emergency relief payments and other development initiatives. Moreover, in the last decade the international community has made a significant transition away from the distribution of in-kind goods toward cash transfers, not only in emergency relief but also in the areas of health, education, food security, and poverty alleviation. While these efforts hold great promise, making an additional shift from physical cash toward electronic payments will allow individuals and organizations to realize fully the benefits of this transition while accelerating the rate of financial inclusion around the world.

Because of the prevalence of cash-based societies in developing markets, NGOs often are forced to rely on physical cash for both their work with beneficiaries (microfinance payments, conditional cash transfers) as well as their internal operations (payroll, expenditures, etc.). While using cash is often the most apparent means of payment, this traditional approach can present significant overhead costs, overburden staffing resources, open the door to corruption and security concerns and present missed opportunities to advance financial inclusion. By exploring new technologies and building new approaches, the humanitarian and development communities can improve the efficiency, transparency and impact of their programs while enabling individuals to begin participating in the formal financial system.

Humanitarian and development organizations already have begun to explore a wide variety of technologies to facilitate payments and manage resources. An increasing array of technologies and opportunities are emerging, providing the flexibility of cash and mitigating the challenges of resource distribution and program operations that transcend diverse geographies. Vouchers, prepaid cards, electronic remittances and mobile money transactions are just a few of the options becoming increasingly available in place of the distribution of physical cash. These mechanisms can have immediate and positive impacts because they help reduce the costs and risks of distributing cash. At the same time, by receiving money electronically, beneficiaries, vendors and employees engage in the financial services cycle and discover the ways in which that cycle can support their livelihoods and their communities.

However, a study by the Cash Learning Partnership entitled, “New Technologies in Cash Transfer Programming and Humanitarian Assistance” reveals significant obstacles facing organizations trying to make this transition, including technological, operational and attitudinal barriers. While some of these barriers are being overcome through greater knowledge-sharing and an increase in public-private partnerships, the report calls for greater investment in overcoming internal barriers and additional funding for adoption of new technologies.

To help organizations address these challenges and questions, Visa has launched the Visa Innovation Grants program. Through this program, Visa is making available five grants of $100,000 each to non-profit humanitarian and development organizations to support innovation, implementation and adoption of electronic transfers and/or payments within their programs and/or within their organizations.

Examples of projects that could be considered for funding:

• Implementing or transitioning a cash transfer program (e.g., cash grants, cash-for-work, voucher) to using electronic payments instead of in-kind goods or physical cash for an emergency humanitarian scenario or in a non-emergency development program
• Electronifying the distribution and repayment of microloans or other financial services
• Electronifying payments to NGO field staff
• Electronifying significant payment streams for local suppliers in the field

By helping humanitarian and development organizations transition to electronic payments and transactions, Visa believes that these grants will help foster financial inclusion in the communities they serve as well as strengthen the organizations’ ability to realize their missions.

Refugee Protection: UNHCR Protection Manual

http://www.unhcr.org/pages/532700d86.html

UNHCR Protection Manual

© UNHCR/B. Szandelszky

A repository of protection policy and guidance

The Protection Manual is the UN refugee agency's repository of protection policy and guidance, gathering some 1,000 publications ranging from the 1951 UN Refugee Convention to the latest UNHCR policy positions.

It is updated whenever a new protection policy or guidance document is published, and can thus be relied upon to represent the current state of UNHCR protection policy and guidance.

The manual is organized thematically or by subject, including legal topics (reflecting, for example,

UNHCR guidance on the different elements of the refugee definition) and operational protection guidance (for example, on asylum-seekers at sea or age, gender and diversity).

Under each heading, the documents are arranged in reverse chronological order and are accessible individually through a hyperlink.

Documents from external sources are generally not included, unless they provide guidance on protection-related topics that also applies to or has specifically been endorsed by UNHCR, such as inter-agency guidance.

At the end of each subject heading, relevant related sources are listed, containing older guidance and documents which serve as background reading.

Thursday, May 15. Health Disparities Seminar - Forging a Research Program on the Health of the Black Middle Class -

NOTE:  For all.  

         Have you attempted to obtain a new physician?

           Are any physicians in your community accepting new patients?

           How far ahead do you have to schedule an appointment for your annual physical?

           Is the problem with the entire industry, and not just for minorities?

           Although disparity for health care is increased for blacks, other minorities and others of lower income

NIH Health Disparities Seminar - Forging a Research Program on the Health of the Black Middle Class - Thursday, May 15

PRESENTATION:

Forging a Research Program on the Health of the Black Middle Class

GUEST SPEAKERS:

Kris Marsh, PhD

Assistant Professor of Sociology

University of Maryland

College Park, MD

Rashawn Ray, PhD

Assistant Professor of Sociology

University of Maryland

College Park, MD

DATE/TIME:

Thursday, May 15, 2014

3:00 - 4:30 P.M.

LOCATION:

NIH Campus

Natcher Conference Center, Building 45, Conference Rooms E1 & E2   

45 Center Drive

Bethesda, MD

PRESENTATION OVERVIEW:

The black middle class is viewed as an example of racial progress. Yet, the health outcomes of middle-class blacks fall dismally behind those of middle-class whites. In this regard, the health outcomes among middle-class blacks stall this alleged progress because middle-class status does not seem to provide the same health benefits to blacks as it does to whites. Without a better understanding of racial differences among the middle class, we cannot devise effective policy solutions to combat health disparities among the most underserved of our population. In their presentations, Dr. Kris Marsh and Dr. Rashawn Ray will provide an overview of a research agenda centered on psychological distress, physical activity, and aging among the black middle class. Using U.S. census and national data, as well as a unique data set on middle-class blacks and whites, they will document how health disparities among the middle class are very much centered on the experiences of black women. They will focus on how the stigma of being single affects the mental health and wealth decisions of middle-class black women as they age and show how the structure of neighborhoods and the social construction of bodies are privileged to support other raced and gendered groups leading to lower levels of physical activity and higher levels of obesity among middle-class black women. Drawing upon the intersectionality framework, they will discuss how the interactive effect of race and gender can be costly for middle-class black women.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS:

Dr. Marsh is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Maryland, College Park, and affiliate faculty of the Maryland Population Research Center, Department of Women's Studies, and African American Studies Department. Previously, she was a postdoctoral scholar at the Carolina Population Center at the University of North Carolina. Dr. Marsh has combined her interests of the black middle class, demography, racial residential segregation, and education to develop a research agenda. This agenda is divided into three broad areas: the black middle class, the intersection of educational attainment and racial identification, and intra-racial health disparities. The common theme in her work is decomposing what it means to be black in America by focusing on intra-group variability in class, space, identity and educational achievement. Dr. Marsh has published work on the demographic shift in the black middle class with the emergence of single and living alone (SALA) households and the residential segregation patterns and trends of black and white SALA households. She received a doctoral degree from the University of Southern California.

Dr. Ray is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Maryland, College Park. Previously, he was a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Policy Research Scholar at the University of California, Berkeley/University of California, San Francisco. Dr. Ray’s research addresses the mechanisms that manufacture and maintain racial and social inequality. His work also speaks to ways that inequality may be attenuated through racial uplift activism and social policy. Dr. Ray is the editor of Race and Ethnic Relations in the Twenty-first Century: History, Theory, Institutions, and Policy. His work has appeared in Ethnic and Racial Studies, American Behavioral Scientist, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, Journal of Higher Education, and Journal of African American Studies. He received a doctoral degree in sociology from Indiana University.  

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

There is limited parking on the NIH campus.  The closest Metro is Medical Center. Please allow adequate time for security check.  

The seminar will be video cast and made available in the NIH Video archives and on the NIMHD website after the seminar.  

Sign Language Interpreters will be provided. Individuals with disabilities who need reasonable accommodations to participate should contact Edgar Dews at (301) 402-1366 or the Federal Relay at 1-800-877-8339.

http://www.domesticpreparedness.com/Government/Government_Updates/CDC_Disease_Detectives_Using_New_Software_Tool_in_Ebola_Hemorrhagic_Fever_Outbreak/

CDC Disease Detectives Using New Software Tool in Ebola Hemorrhagic Fever Outbreak

Fri, May 02, 2014

For the first time, Ebola hemorrhagic fever outbreak disease detectives are using a new software tool to help find people exposed to the deadly virus faster. 

The new tool developed at CDC, an Epi Info viral hemorrhagic fever (VHF) application, speeds up one of the most difficult parts of disease detection: finding everyone that was exposed to, and possibly infected by, someone with a contagious disease. This task, called contact tracing, is an essential step in breaking the chain of disease transmission and ending an outbreak.  In addition to facilitating contact tracing, the tool assists with the collection and management of epidemiologic, clinical, and laboratory information for every case. This data is crucial for developing outbreak countermeasures. 

The Epi Info VHF tool is specifically designed for outbreaks of viral hemorrhagic fevers such as Ebola, Marburg, Rift Valley, Lassa, and Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fevers. The open-source program runs on the Epi Info software platform that CDC has made freely available since the 1990s. It features virus transmission diagrams that help field workers visualize outbreak spread between people and automated tools that speed contact tracing and data analysis. 

“With a disease as often fatal as Ebola, quickly identifying and following up with those who may have been exposed is key to saving lives and containing the outbreak,” said CDC Director Tom Frieden, M.D., M.P.H. “Epi Info, the ‘Swiss Army knife’ of field-deployed epidemiologists, can now help to track disease more quickly.” 

CDC began development of the VHF application for Epi Info after the 2012 Ebola and Marburg hemorrhagic fever outbreaks in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Upon returning from the field, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) Officer Ilana Schafer, D.V.M., M.S.P.H., approached CDC’s Epi Info team, saying, “There has to be a better way to do this. People are dying and we can’t collect, analyze, and act on the data fast enough.” 

Schafer worked on four outbreak responses in 2012 – three Ebola outbreaks and one Marburg outbreak. She was responsible for creating and maintaining centralized databases for all case epidemiologic, clinical, and laboratory information collected by international response partners, including Ministries of Health, Doctors without Borders (Médécins sans Frontières), CDC, and the World Health Organization (WHO), during three of the outbreaks. She was on the CDC/WHO team recently deployed to Guinea for the West Africa Ebola outbreak, along with CDC Epi Info software developer Erik Knudsen, who is tweaking the new VHF tool on the ground as needed. 

“As Ebola outbreaks are rare, this is the first time we’re getting to put this tool through its paces,” said CDC Epi Info team lead Asad Islam, M.S. “Given that the Epi Info VHF tool has a tiny IT footprint and easily works in places with limited network connectivity, that it automatically updates as new information is added, and that it offers daily reports to guide follow-up, we are cautiously optimistic that it will make a significant difference.” 

An earlier version of the Epi Info VHF tool was presented in Uganda in September of 2013 to the Ugandan Ministry of Health, Doctors without Borders, and WHO; they provided valuable feedback that was incorporated into the current version. 

Epi Info software is used globally for rapidly assessing disease outbreaks and for speeding disease detection and response. Developing the VHF tool on the Epi Info platform was far more timely and cost-effective than contracting for development of a specialized system. In addition, once finalized as a standard feature and added to Epi Info, the tool will be available cost-free to be adapted for future public health needs. 

This innovation was the result of collaboration between CDC’s Epi Info team in the Center for Surveillance, Epidemiology, and Laboratory Services and the Viral Special Pathogens Branch in the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases. It coincides with the launch of the U.S. government’s Global Health Security Agenda to strengthen national security by helping other nations prevent, detect, and effectively respond to disease outbreaks. Over the next five years, the initiative will strengthen the health infrastructure of at least 30 partner countries with 4 billion citizens. CDC has invested $40 million this year in the effort and President Barack Obama has requested an additional $45 million in his 2015 budget request toward this purpose. 

Ebola virus is transmitted through direct physical contact with body fluids of an infected person including blood, saliva, stool, urine, and sweat, as well as direct physical contact with objects that have been contaminated by the infected body fluids, such as needles and soiled linens. Outbreaks can spread rapidly, with easily misdiagnosed initial symptoms such as fever, body aches, diarrhea and vomiting and an incubation period as brief as two days and as long as three weeks. 

For more information about the current outbreak of Ebola in Guinea and Liberia, see http://www.cdc.gov/vhf/ebola/outbreaks/guinea/. 

For more information about Epi Info, see www.cdc.gov/epiinfo.

December 1-3, 2014. International Symposium on Minority Health and Health Disparities conference

2014 International Symposium

Dear Colleague: As Principal Investigator of the 2014 International Symposium on Minority Health and Health Disparities conference grant, I am writing to encourage you to participate in this longstanding, historic, scientific program to be held December 1-3, 2014 in National Harbor, Maryland. Along with conference co-chairs, Drs Mark Edberg, George Washington University, and Barbara Hayes, Texas Southern University, we encourage you to register and attend the conference, submit abstracts prior to the June 2 deadline, and secure exhibit space and ads.  The program is titled “Transdisciplinary Collaborations: Evolving Dimensions of US and Global Health Equity” and is a must attend scientific program for 2014. The Symposium planning, scientific, abstract and cultural committees look forward to welcoming you to the greater Washington, DC area to share your expertise to improve minority health and to reduce and eliminate health disparities. Also, we encourage you to volunteer as an abstract reviewer for the symposium. More information about the Symposium is available at http://www.ismhhd.com.  Please call our Secretariat at 404.559.6191 or email secretariat@ismhhd.com if you have questions. Registration for the Symposium is now open. Sincerely, Valerie Montgomery Rice, MD Principal Investigator ISMHHD Conference Grant