Bibi-Aisha Wadvalla
Read the full text of the Minster of Health’s budget speech presented to parliament on May 13.
With 6000 children dying each day of water-borne diseases, delegates at the World Summit on Sustainable Development are fighting for a specific target on sanitation to be included in the final plan of action. But their proposal is being opposed by the US, Japan, Canada and New Zealand who wish to avoid being tied down to a specific target.
Health took its place at the center of deliberations as the World Summit on Sustainable Development got underway yesterday with delegates raising concerns that while there had been some advances in improving the health of people around the world since the Rio summit, the reality was that they were not on target.
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In Uganda, a concerted effort by political, community and religious leaders as well as the country’s health sector has reduced HIV prevalence from a high of 30 percent to between 6 and 8 percent today. In this audio report we talk to Dr Alex Coutinho of TASA – The AIDS Support Organisation in Uganda – about what the country has done to destigmatise the disease and reduce HIV prevalence.
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Former president Nelson Mandela has called on government and business leaders worldwide to find ways to provide access to treatment for all people living with HIV/AIDS who need it.
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Based on existing resources, South Africa can ‘easily afford’ to provide anti-retroviral therapy to between 60 000 and 70 000 people in the next five years. This was the conclusion from a study by Dr Chris Kenyon of the Health Systems Trust and Dr Andrew Boulle, a registrar in the School of Public Health at the University of Cape Town, presented at the 14th World Conference on AIDS in Barcelona yesterday (Tuesday).
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t’s nearly a decade since the 12-year long civil war in Mozambique ended. Athough the country is re-building, the challenges are immense. Not least is an official HIV prevalence rate of 13% which in the large cities like Maputo and Beira is thought to be closer to 30%. One of the biggest battles is how to find the resources – human and financial – to respond to the many needs facing the country. When it comes to HIV/AIDS specifically, entrenched cultural attitudes further complicate the equation. In this audio report, the executive secretary of the National AIDS Council Janet Mondlane outlines what they’re up against.
Health-e editor, Sue Valentine has been awarded a Nieman Fellowship for the 2002-2003 North American academic year. She will be part of a group of 12 U.S. journalists and 13 international journalists who will make up the 65th class of Nieman Fellows at Harvard University. Established in 1938, the Nieman program is the oldest mid-career fellowship for journalists in the world. The fellowships are awarded to working journalists of accomplishment and promise for an academic year of study in any part of the university. More than one thousand U.S. and international journalists have studied at Harvard as Nieman Fellows.
Values like freedom, equality and democracy are hollow concepts for women who still are subject to the control of others when it comes to their reproductive rights. The parliamentary Health Portfolio committee held hearings recently to take stock of the implementation of a key piece of legislation passed six years ago, the 1996 Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act. In this audio report by Sue Valentine, health professionals, social workers and researchers speak about the impact the legislation has made in the past five years.
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In the first ever study tracking the safety of blood transfusions in SA, the SA National Blood Service (SANBS) found that local blood services are as safe as those in any developed country. Kathryn Strachan reports.
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The South African trial of an HIV vaccine is in a state of animated suspension. The clinical sites of Baragwanath Hospital and the Durban Medical Research Council (MRC) have been chosen and approval has been received from the Wits University ethics committee. All that the National Institute for Virology, which is co-ordinating the process, is waiting for now is the go-ahead from the Medicines Control Council, and it is hoped that the trials can begin towards the middle of the year.
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When the Baragwanath Perinatal HIV Research Unit submitted its list of items that needed to be financed as part of the forthcoming HIV vaccine trials, it made for interesting reading: included on the list is R600 for a sacrificial goat.