Bibi-Aisha Wadvalla
A South African generic manufacturer recently won its case against pharmaceutical giant SmithKline Beecham allowing it to produce a generic of SKB’€™s penicillin-based antibiotic.
Research published in the British Medical Journal shows that it is impossible to predict ovulation – even among those women with regular menstrual cycles. It explains why the rhythm method for planning or preventing pregnancy is wholly unreliable.
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Voluntary HIV testing and counselling is among the priorities listed by the South African health department in its HIV/AIDS Strategic Plan for South Africa 2000 ‘€“ 2005, but in reality it’€™s difficult to find a public clinic that will offer this service to citizens.
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The past 11 months have seen HIV/AIDS assume the spotlight in South Africa as never before. However, despite all the meetings, protests and discussions, people have continued to die from AIDS-related symptoms and the numbers of AIDS orphans and HIV positive babies have continued to climb. In this article, we take a month by month look at AIDS in South Africa in 2000.
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On World AIDS Day, December 1, paediatricians around the country will hand in petitions to their respective MECs for Health. Their call is for government to provide the affordable, anti-retroviral drug Nevirapine to help prevent the transmission of HIV from mothers to their babies. This action is in response to the growing frustration and despondency among doctors who are left virtually helpless in the face of the epidemic and can offer little more than palliative care to their patients. Health-e spoke to a paediatrician who works at Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital.
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Mercy Makhalemele has been thrown out of home, fired from her job, rejected and beaten, all because people discovered she was HIV positive. She is now open and outspoken about her life and the virus she lives with. Listen to her talk about living with AIDS.
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In the past ten years, conservative estimates show that the HIV infection rate has risen from 0,2% in 1990 to 22,4% in 1999. Clearly the prevention message has not been heard. In this week’s feature, health workers in the Western Cape speak out about what they think should be said and done.
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It can be uncomfortable talking about sex and sexuality because it’€™s such a private thing, acknowledges psychologist and guidance counsellor, Ingrid Owens, but she has no doubt that children want to talk.
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In this programme, we spend a few minutes in the company of satirist Pieter Dirk Uys as he does his one-man AIDS awareness show for school pupils at Simonstown School. In the audience at this performance is the health minister, Manto Tshabalala-Msimang. Sue Valentine reports.
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Some mining companies have adopted a controversial new approach to HIV prevention which involves the ongoing use of antibiotics among women at high risk of spreading STDs. The programme translates into a saving of almost R4 million per annum to the mining companies involved.
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Sindiswa Gondwana is HIV positive, but lives a full and active life, thanks largely to the support of friends and family. She believes firmly in the value of support groups and is herself a volunteer who visits people who are HIV positive, encouraging them to adopt an optimistic approach to life.
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New research provides direct evidence that anti-retroviral drugs can prevent HIV infection after sexual intercourse. This research comes amid a series of controversial decisions regarding the provision of AZT to rape victims in South Africa. The new national guidelines for HIV care launched on Tuesday (24th October) deny the use of anti-retroviral drugs to rape survivors but the Western Cape will provide AZT to rape survivors nonetheless. Jo Stein reports.