Alice Zwerling

Dados Biográficos

ID6161196
NOMEAlice Zwerling
PRENOMESAlice
SOBRENOMEZwerling
ASSINATURAZWERLING A
AFILIAÇÕESUniversity of Ottawa
ORCID0000-0003-1613-8525
VERIFICADOSim
TOTAL DE OBRAS26
TOTAL DE CITAÇÕES2
TOTAL COMO AUTOR12
TOTAL COMO EDITOR14
PRIMEIRO ANO DE PUBLICAÇÃO2009
ANO MAIS RECENTE DE PUBLICAÇÃO2026
ÍNDICE H1

  • HIV epidemic in Lesotho – HIV treatment and monitoring of patients on antiretroviral therapy 2014-2024

    Open AccessSenate Moshoeshoe, Maletsatsi Motebang et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2026

    This study evaluates progress in expanding access to antiretroviral therapy (ART) and HIV viral load (VL) monitoring in Lesotho using programmatic data 2014–2024. As a lower middle-income country in Southern Africa, Lesotho maintains the world’s second highest HIV prevalence (25.6%).Retrospective, countrywide data from 2014-2024 were assessed, including the cumulative number of people living with HIV receiving ART, the proportion of ART patients …

  • Progress towards measles and rubella elimination in Eswatini by 2024

    Open AccessXolisile Dlamini, Tholokwakhe Simelane et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2026

    Eswatini has been implementing measles and rubella elimination strategies, aligning with the WHO African Regional goal. This report reviews the immunization coverage and surveillance data to evaluate the country’s progress towards the elimination goals. We reviewed routine immunisation coverage data, supplemental immunisation activity coverage data, and case based and laboratory surveillance data for measles and rubella. Routine immunization cove…

  • Inequalities in financial burden of tuberculosis among affected families across 19 low- and middle-income countries

    Open AccessGilbert Eshun, Umaru Sesay et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2026

    Tuberculosis (TB) remains a major global public health problem, with majority of the cases occurring in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Despite its growing burden, cross-country evidence on inequalities in financial burden among affected families is limited. This study aims to assess catastrophic costs and related inequalities across 19 LMICs. The study employed a cross-country analysis of 19 national TB Patient Cost Surveys data extrac…

  • Understanding the cost-utility of implementing HIV self-testing with digital-based supports

    Open AccessBrianna Empringham, Angela Karellis et al.ARTICLEFrontiers in Public Health2025

    Introduction: HIV self-testing (HIVST) is an innovative strategy that has been shown to increase uptake of HIV testing compared to conventional facility-based testing. HIVST implementation with digital-based supports may help facilitate testing accessibility and linkage to care after a reactive self-test. Economic evidence around community-based implementation of HIVST is growing; however, economic evidence around digital-based HIVST approaches r…

  • Concurrent use of low complexity automated Naats for TB diagnosis and detection of resistance

    Open AccessSuvesh Kumar Shrestha, Funeka Bango et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2025

    Current TB diagnostics relying on respiratory samples are less effective in children (under 10 years), children living with HIV (CLHIV) and adult people living with HIV (PLHIV). Concurrent testing using low-complexity automated nucleic acid amplification tests (LC-aNAATs) on multiple sample types and Lateral Flow Lipoarabinomannan (LF-LAM) improves diagnostic performance, but concerns about cost-effectiveness remain. To inform WHO guideline devel…

  • The catastrophic cost of TB care

    Open AccessOlivia Alise D’Silva, Samantha Lancione et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2025

    Eliminating the burden of catastrophic costs experienced by individuals undergoing tuberculosis (TB) treatment is one of the World Health Organization (WHO) End TB Strategy targets. To help inform decisions on TB patient burden and cost-effective TB care, we conducted a systematic review to summarize current evidence around the burden of catastrophic costs incurred by individuals undergoing TB treatment and identified the main drivers of costs to…

  • Systematic review of the economic impact of novel Mycobacterium tuberculosis specific antigen-based skin tests for detection of TB infection compared with tuberculin skin test and interferon-gamma rel…

    Open AccessLara Goscé, Kasim Allel et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2024

    The Purified Protein Derivative tuberculin skin tests (TST) and blood-based Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M . tb) specific interferon-gamma release assays (IGRA) are the currently used tests for identifying individuals with TB infection for preventive treatment. However, challenges around access and implementation have limited their use. Novel M . tb specific skin tests (TBST) such as Diaskintest, ESAT6-CFP10 (C-TST), C-Tb (also known as Cy-Tb), an…

  • Cost-effectiveness of diagnostic technologies for mycobacterium tuberculosis infection in India and Brazil

    Open AccessSaima Bashir, Shehzad Ali et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2024

    The economic value of new skin-based tests and blood-based interferon-γ release assays (IGRAs) for tuberculosis (TB) infection is not yet well-established. This study evaluates the cost and cost-effectiveness in two high-burden countries by comparing:(a) new skin-based tests(Diaskintest and Cy-Tb) with the purified protein derivative (PPD)-tuberculin test (TST);(b) IGRAs (Standard E TB-Feron ELISA (TBF))with approved IGRAs (QuantiFERON-TB Gold Pl…

  • How much does HIV self-testing cost in low and middle income countries? A systematic review of evidence from economic studies

    Open AccessBrianna Empringham, Angela Karellis et al.ARTICLEFrontiers in Public Health2023

  • Public health benefits of shifting from hospital-focused to ambulatory TB care in Eastern Europe

    Open AccessSherrie L Kelly, Gerard Joseph Abou Jaoude et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2023

    High rates of drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB) continue to threaten public health, especially in Eastern Europe. Costs for treating DR-TB are substantially higher than treating drug-susceptible TB, and higher yet if DR-TB services are delivered in hospital. The WHO recommends that multidrug-resistant (MDR) TB be treated using mainly ambulatory care, shown to have non-inferior health outcomes, however, there has been a delay to transition away …

  • Malaria diagnosis in rural healthcare facilities and treatment-seeking behavior in malaria endemic settings in western Kenya

    Open AccessCollince J Omondi, David Odongo et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2023

    Accurate malaria diagnosis and timely treatment are requirements for effective management of the disease. However, treatment efficacy may be significantly reduced in resource-constrained healthcare facilities with poorly equipped laboratories and frequent drug and rapid diagnostic test kit (RDT) stock-outs. Furthermore, patient may avoid seeking treatment from such facilities. The study’s goal was to determine treatment-seeking behavior, malaria …

  • Journey of the tuberculosis patients in India from onset of symptom till one-year post-treatment

    Open AccessSusmita Chatterjee, Palash Das et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2023

    Historically, economic studies on tuberculosis estimated out-of-pocket expenses related to tuberculosis treatment and catastrophic cost, however, no study has yet been conducted to understand the post-treatment economic conditions of the tuberculosis patients in India. In this paper, we add to this body of knowledge by examining the experiences of the tuberculosis patients from the onset of symptoms till one-year post-treatment. 829 adult drug-su…

  • Impact of active case-finding for tuberculosis on case-notifications in Blantyre, Malawi

    Open AccessHelena R A Feasey, McEwen Khundi et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2023

    Active case-finding (ACF) for tuberculosis can help find the “missing millions” with undiagnosed tuberculosis. In a cluster-randomised trial, we investigated impact of ACF on case-notifications in Blantyre, Malawi, where ACF has been intensively implemented following 2014 estimates of ~1,000 per 100,000 adults with undiagnosed TB. Following a pre-intervention prevalence survey (May 2019 to March 2020), constrained randomisation allocated neighbou…

  • Economic evaluation of novel Mycobacterium tuberculosis specific antigen-based skin tests for detection of TB infection

    Open AccessLara Goscé, Kasim Allel et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2023

    Evidence on the economic impact of novel skin tests for tuberculosis infection (TBST) is scarce and limited by study quality. We used estimates on the cost-effectiveness of the use of TBST compared to current tuberculosis infection (TBI) tests to assess whether TBST are affordable and feasible to implement under different country contexts. A Markov model parametrised to Brazil, South Africa and the UK was developed to compare the cost-effectivene…

  • Cost-effectiveness of Hepatitis C virus self-testing in four settings

    Open AccessJohn Geoffrey Walker, Josephine G Walker et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2023

    Globally, there are approximately 58 million people with chronic hepatitis C virus infection (HCV) but only 20% have been diagnosed. HCV self-testing (HCVST) could reach those who have never been tested and increase uptake of HCV testing services. We compared cost per HCV viraemic diagnosis or cure for HCVST versus facility-based HCV testing services. We used a decision analysis model with a one-year time horizon to examine the key drivers of eco…

  • Tracking changes in national BCG vaccination policies and practices using the BCG World Atlas

    Open AccessSamantha Lancione, Jonathan Villa Alvarez et al.ARTICLEBMJ Global Health2022

    The BCG vaccine is a widely given vaccine against tuberculosis (TB), yet studies on effectiveness have shown considerable heterogeneity; as a result, BCG vaccine policies vary greatly across the globe and change across geography, and with time and disease burden. The recently updated third BCG World Atlas ( www.bcgatlas.org ) is a publicly available online database with information on BCG practices across 194 countries. This helpful resource has …

  • Disadvantage and the experience of treatment for multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB)

    Open AccessHolly A Taylor, David Dowdy et al.ARTICLESSM - Qualitative Research in…2022

    In the present research, we aimed to demonstrate how exploring patients’ treatment experiences may help decision makers better understand and pay attention to social impacts of health interventions. We take multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) as a paradigm case of a disease that disproportionately affects people already living with disadvantage and for which treatment itself is extremely burdensome. We conducted a total of 140 in-depth int…

  • Conceptualizing monetary benchmarks for health investments toward poverty reduction in low- and lower middle-income countries

    Open AccessAveri Chakrabarti, Stéphane Verguet et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2022

    Public spending can improve population well-being, for example, by averting or reducing poverty. We aim to conceptualize monetary benchmarks for health sector investments oriented towards poverty alleviation in low- and lower middle-income countries. These benchmarks are meant to indicate the approximate range of health sector costs incurred to avert a single case of poverty across countries. Such conceptualizations could help identify the health…

  • Optimizing availability of obstetric surgical care in India

    Open AccessLina Roa, Luke Caddell et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2022

    The objective of this study is to assess the cost-effectiveness of three different strategies with different availabilities of cesarean sections (CS). The setting was rural and urban areas of India with varying rates of CS and access to comprehensive emergency obstetric care (CEmOC) for women of reproductive age in India. Three strategies with different access to CEmOC and CS rates were evaluated: (A) India’s national average (50.2% access, 17.2%…

  • Performance of HIV rapid testing algorithm in Nigeria

    Open AccessHetal K Patel, Sunday Ikpe et al.ARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2022

    Background The Nigeria AIDS Indicator and Impact Survey (NAIIS), a cross-sectional household survey, was conducted in 2018 with primary objectives to estimate HIV prevalence, HIV-1 incidence, and status of UNAIDS 90-90-90 cascade. We conducted retrospective analysis of the performance of HIV rapid tests and the national HIV testing algorithm used in Nigeria. Methods The national algorithm included Determine HIV-1/2 as test 1 (T1), Unigold HIV-1/2…

  • Impact of a personalised, digital, HIV self-testing app-based program on linkages and new infections in the township populations of South Africa

    Open AccessNitika Pant Pai, Aliasgar Esmail et al.ARTICLEBMJ Global Health2021

    INTRODUCTION: Implementation data for digital unsupervised HIV self-testing (HIVST) are sparse. We evaluated the impact of an app-based, personalised, oral HIVST program offered by healthcare workers in Western Cape, South Africa. METHODS: In a quasirandomised study (n=3095), we recruited consenting adults with undiagnosed HIV infection from township clinics. To the HIVST arm participants (n=1535), we offered a choice of an offsite (home, office …

  • Seven-year retrospective study understanding the latent TB infection treatment cascade of care among adults in a low incidence country

    Open AccessKathryn Sullivan, Christopher Pease et al.ARTICLEBMC Public Health2021

    LTBI treatment completion was significantly decreased among patients who were referred back to primary care from the TB clinic. The 4R regimen resulted in more people completing LTBI treatment compared to 9H in keeping with a recently published RCT. Improved education, communication, and collaboration between tertiary care TB clinics and primary care teams may improve treatment completion rates and address the TB burden in low incidence communiti…

  • Social determinants of health among residential areas with a high tuberculosis incidence in a remote Inuit community

    Elaine Kilabuk, Franco Momoli et al.ARTICLEJournal of Epidemiology and…2019Citada por: 2Referências: 16

    BACKGROUND: Tuberculosis (TB) remains a significant health burden among Inuit in Canada. Social determinants of health (SDH) play a key role in TB infection, disease and ongoing transmission in this population. The objective of this research was to estimate the prevalence of social determinants of Inuit health as they relate to latent TB infection (LTBI) among people living in residential areas at high risk for TB in Iqaluit, Nunavut. METHODS: In…

  • Integrating social justice concerns into economic evaluation for healthcare and public health

    Open AccessVadim Dukhanin, Alexandra Searle et al.ARTICLESocial Science & Medicine2018

  • Tuberculosis and homelessness in Montreal

    Open AccessJason Tan de Bibiana, Carmine Rossi et al.ARTICLEBMC Public Health2011

    TB cases among homeless persons in Montreal raise concerns about delayed diagnosis and ongoing local transmission