Health e News
Creative thinking has enabled Kimberley to have one of the best doctor-patient ratios in the country.
Patients are dying unnecessarily because South Africa’s public hospitals are over-burdened, under-staffed and poorly managed.
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There are still no definite answers from the Health Department regarding the fate their flagship HIV/AIDS communication campaign, Khomanani. There have been widespread reports that the programme has been halted. But the Health Minister says that’s news to her.
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Beetroot, lemon, garlic and African potato were at the heart of a bitter conflict between Health Minister Dr Manto Tshabalala-Msimang and AIDS activists over government’s AIDS programme at the International AIDS Conference in Toronto over the past week.
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A doctor who gave up a thriving private practice in Gauteng to help people living with HIV in a rural backwater was named ‘Rural Doctor of the Year’ last week.
Densely populated, crime ridden; filthy and full of brothels is how Hillbrow is usually described. Sex workers thrive. The rate of sexually transmitted infections is high in such areas. Yet an HIV Voluntary Counselling and Testing programme introduced a few years ago is showing positive results. And a number of women in this area celebrate Women’s Day with vigour ‘ knowing that they have a clean bill of health.
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It was with a sense of a ‘big head’ that Alan Brand decided to take an overall medical check up. He had achieved most of his short term goals. Testing positive for HIV never even occurred to him. But soon after finding out that he had the virus, he was overwhelmed by guilt.
For 40 years, the SA Red Cross Air Mercy Service has been flying volunteer health professionals to rural hospitals in KwaZulu-Natal and the Northern Cape.
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South Africa will be in the spotlight at the 16th International AIDS Conference in Toronto when the merits of male circumcision come up for discussion.
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The ‘I didn’t have a condom’ excuse could soon be unheard of if the marketing of an innovative underwear brand succeeds. The underwear features a unique pocket that can carry up to three condoms ‘ for use at opportune times.
Khopotso Bodibe and Anso Thom from Health-e News Service were selected from more than 135 Applicants from 29 African Countries as recipients of the first Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation Award for Excellence in HIV/AIDS Journalism in Africa for their investigative reporting on HIV/AIDS.
Nine years ago, Dr Loyiso Mpuntsha was rejected as a blood donor. Today she is the new Chief Executive Officer of the South African National Blood Service, the same organisation that did not want her blood ‘ solely because she is black.