The Bulletin of the World Health Organization is an international journal of public health with a special focus on developing countries. Since it was first published in 1948 the Bulletin has become one of the world's leading public health journals. As the flagship periodical of the World Health Organization (WHO) the Bulletin draws on WHO experts as editorial advisers reviewers and authors as well as on external collaborators. In this month's issue: A framework convention on global health: a catalyst for justice; Phenobarbital: missing in action; Lead exposure from soil in Peruvian mining towns: a national assessment supported by two contrasting examples; Mid-upper arm circumference at age of routine infant vaccination to identify infants at elevated risk of death: a retrospective cohort study in the Gambia; Monitoring antimalarial drug resistance in India via sentinel sites: outcomes and risk factors for treatment failure 2009-2010; Antibiotics Smart Use: a workable model for promoting the rational use of medicines in Thailand; Low-cost tools for diagnosing and monitoring HIV infection in low-resource settings; Country adaptation of the 2010 World Health Organization recommendations for the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV; Systematic archiving and access to health research data: rationale current status and way forward;Cost-effectiveness analysis of pandemic influenza preparedness: what s missing?.