Childhood Pneumonia
Global study begins
The International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (ICDDR,B) has been collaborating in a global study on childhood pneumonia that is expected to provide new data on the causes of the disease and ultimately guide the next generation about pneumonia prevention and treatment.
Pneumonia, the world's biggest killer of young children, now accounts for 20 percent of childhood deaths in developing countries including Bangladesh, said ICDDR,B sources.
The centre has recently embarked on a groundbreaking new multi-country "Pneumonia etiology research for child health (PERCH) study" coordinated by the International Vaccine Access Centre (IVAC) at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
The study is the first of its kind in over two decades with collaboration among five African and two Asian research sites and is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
It is being conducted in Bangladesh, Thailand, Gambia, Kenya, Mali, South Africa, and Zambia in collaboration with local and international research stations and universities, including laboratory support from the University of Otago and Canterbury Health Laboratories, New Zealand.
The study aims to enroll more than 12,000 children in the seven study countries. The countries have been selected for representing areas where most of the severe pneumonia cases in children are most likely to occur in 2015 and where key interventions are already in place.
ICDDR,B will play a major role in the study, as its laboratory facilities in Matlab in Chandpur, the acute respiratory infection ward at its Dhaka Hospital, its surveillance site in the city's Kamalapur will be instrumental in collecting samples from malnourished children under five who suffer from pneumonia and are also malnourished.
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