Colin Mathers who leads the Global Burden of Disease group in WHO has confirmed that, in the 2004 GBD, 13.1% of global Daily Adjusted Life Years are attributable to mental or neurological disorders. While the proportions vary very widely from about 10% in low income countries to over 25% in high income countries, it is clear that there is a need for understanding how to address this issue. This volume aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the public health principles of mental and neurological disorders. This vast range of health conditions affects people across the life course, from developmental disabilities in childhood, to schizophrenia and substance abuse in adults, and dementia in old age. Despite this diversity, they all share many features: they are mostly mediated through brain dysfunction or abnormalities, are often chronic in course, typically benefit from multi-component interventions, and are amongst the most neglected conditions in global health. The volume will bring together chapters from the Psychiatry, Neurology, Substance Abuse and Child Development sections of the Encyclopedia of Public Health. The volume will be the first comprehensive text on a public health approach to this diverse group of health conditions and has no obvious competitor.

Emerging infectious diseases may be defined as diseases being caused by pathogens only recently recognized to exist. This group of diseases is important globally, and the experience of the last 30 years suggests that new emerging diseases are likely to bedevil us. As the global climate changes, so changes the environment, which can support not only the pathogens, but also their vectors of transmission. This expands the exposure and effects of infectious disease and, therefore, the importance of widespread understanding of the relationship between public health and infectious disease.

This work brings together chaptersthat explain reasons for the emergence of these infectious diseases. These include the ecological context of human interactions with other humans, with animalsthat may host human pathogens, and with a changing agricultural and industrial environment, increasing resistance to antimicrobials, the ubiquity of global travel, and international commerce.

* Features the latest discoveries related to influenza with a newly published article by Davidson Hamer and Jean van Seventer

* Provides a listing of rarediseases that have become resurgent or spread their geographic distribution andare re-emergent

* Highlights dengue and malaria, as well as agents such as West Nile and other arboviruses that have spread to new continents causing widespread concerns

* Includes discussions of climate influencing the spread of infectious disease andpolitical and societal aspects"

This volume is unique inits systematic approach to these three pillars of health systems analysis will give readers of various backgrounds authoritative material about subjects adjacent to their own specialties. Assembling such comparative materials is usually an onerous task because so many programs possess their own vocabularies, goals, and methods. This book will provide common grounds for people in programs as diverse as economics and finance, allied health, business and management, and the social sciences, including psychology.

This volume is unique inits systematic approach to these three pillars of health systems analysis will give readers of various backgrounds authoritative material about subjects adjacent to their own specialties. Assembling such comparative materials is usually an onerous task because so many programs possess their own vocabularies, goals, and methods. This book will provide common grounds for people in programs as diverse as economics and finance, allied health, business and management, and the social sciences, including psychology. "

Epidemiology and Demography provides practical guidance on planning and implementing surveillance and investigation of disease and disease outbreaks. Exploring contributing factors to the dynamics of disease transmission and the identification of population risks, it also includes a discussion of ehtics in epidemiology and demography including important issues of privacy vs. public safety. With a chapter on H1N1 and Bird flu, this book will be important for students and professionals in public health and epidemiology.

Focuses on the techniques of surveillance and investigation of disease

Includes biostatistics and analysis techniques

Explores the ethics of disease studies

Includes chapter discussing H1N1 and Bird Flu

This volume brings together two areas of health that are among the foci of current development efforts, as articulated by the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), namely sexual and reproductive health (MDG 5: improve maternal health, target 2: achieve, by 2015, universal access to reproductive health); and Gender (MDG 3: promote gender equality and empower women). Few, if any, published books have dealt in a comprehensive way with public health aspects of these two strongly interrelated areas of health. Most published volumes devoted to sexual and reproductive health have a strong clinical focus, whereas books on gender tend to concentrate primarily on the socio-cultural and anthropological aspects of the subject.

Research on the family has expanded considerably across Asia but studies tend to be fragmented, focusing on narrow issues within limited areas (cities, towns, small communities) and may not be accessible to international readers. These limitations make it difficult for researchers, students, policy makers, and practitioners to obtain the information they need. The Routledge Handbook of Families in Asia fills that gap by providing a current and comprehensive analysis of Asian families by a wide range of experts in a single publication. The thirty-two chapters of this comparative and multi-disciplinary volume are organized into nine major themes: conceptual approaches, methodological issues, family life in the context of culture, family relationships across the family life cycle, issues of work and income, stress and conflict, family diversity, family policy and laws, and environmental setting of homes. Each chapter examines family life across Asian countries, studying cultural similarities and differences and exploring how families are changing and what trends are likely to develop in the future. To provide a fruitful learning experience for the reader, each chapter offers examples, relevant data, and a comprehensive list of references. Offering a complete interdisciplinary overview of families in Asia, the Handbook will be of interest to students, academics, policy makers and practitioners across the disciplines of Asian Studies, Sociology, Demography, Social Work, Law, Social Policy, Anthropology, Geography, Public Health and Architecture.

Research on the family has expanded considerably across Asia but studies tend to be fragmented, focusing on narrow issues within limited areas (cities, towns, small communities) and may not accessible to international readers. These limitations make it difficult for researchers, university teachers, undergraduate and graduate students, policy makers, and practitioners, to obtain the information they need. Consequently, the proposed "Handbook of Families in Asia" fills that knowledge gap by providing a current and comprehensive analysis of Asian families by a wide range of experts in a single publication.

The "Handbook" will have 30 to 34 chapters organized into eight thematic sections:

(1) Conceptualizing family in Asia;

(2) Methodological issues of research on families;

(3) Family life in the context of religion and culture in Asia; (4) Family relationships across the life cycle;

(5) Family, work and income;

(6) Stress and conflict in the family;

(7) Family and the law; and

(8) Space and environmental settings of family life

Part 1 and Part 2 focus on research at the conceptual and methodological levels. Parts 3 to 8 cover substantial issues taking into consideration the rich tapestry of cultural and religious values across Asian countries. Each chapter will discuss its specific subject matter from this comparative perspective at two levels: (a) the body of knowledge both theoretical and methodological offered by family research in Asia as compared to that of other countries or world regions; and (b) the empirical findings on family life and development in Asian countries vis-a-vis trends observed in other world regions. Furthermore, to provide a fruitful learning experience for the reader, each chapter will offer empirical examples and/or relevant data, and a comprehensive list of references.