If the rich consume more health resources than the poor, any efforts to redress the gap between the haves and have-nots must include a commitment to equity and not just equality. Sue Valentine attended a recent international workshop in the North West Province aimed at developing efective equity gauges to measure the gaps in health spending and resource allocation.
Read More »Making people countVolunteering is no longer just for those with time and money to spare, it can be a major social force and will become a necessity in order to care for people with HIV/AIDS, says the director of The Volunteer Centre in Cape Town, Joan Daries.
Read More »Volunteers make all the differenceFor many young people, resigned to a life with few opportunities and a future without promise, sex is one of life?s few pleasures. But their lack of faith in the future means that many are not bothering to practice safe sex.
Read More »Safe sex undermined by pessimismThe Compensation Commissioner's Office has been strongly criticised for the time it takes to settle workers' occupational health claims. Some say this is the fault of companies that obstruct the commission's work, but regardless of where the blame lies, it is workers like Derick Wolfaardt who suffer the consequences. Jo Stein reports.
Read More »Workers’ compensation ‘ too little, too lateDURBAN- "The challenge is to move from rhetoric to action," said Nelson Mandela at the closing ceremony of the AIDS 2000 conference, as he underlined the importance of safer sex, the use of condoms and interventions to stop mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS.
Read More »MandelaGail Johnson adopted Nkosi Johnson when he was three years old. Despite being HIV positive, Nkosi is now eleven. Nkosi dreamed the other night that a voice told him he must die. When Gail asked him if he wanted to die, Nkosi said, "No, not yet." "Well then," replied Gail, "We've got to fight."
Read More »Talking to HIV positive children about death and dyingDURBAN- "The challenge is to move from rhetoric to action," said Nelson Mandela at the closing ceremony of the AIDS 2000 conference, as he underlined the importance of safer sex, the use of condoms and interventions to stop mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS.
Read More »Mandela stills the tormented hearts of South Africans"If you have a very big elephant and you want to eat it up, you start from all corners. That way you'll finish it up." So says Edith Mukisa, the founder of Uganda's Teenage HIV/AIDS Clinic in Naguru, just outside the capital Kampala.This is the philosophy that lies at the core of Uganda's multi-sectoral response to the HIV/AIDS pandemic. And it's paying dividends. by Carolyn Dempster
Read More »Hope for the future: Ugandan youth turn back the HIV tideBrett Anderson never thought he had contracted HIV. "I was as sick as a dog but I never thought of HIV despite having all the symptoms. It never crossed my mind. It simply wasn't real to me. Now, it's in my blood. It's part of my life," says the 28-year-old Capetonian.
Read More »Appreciating every dayDURBAN - More than 5 000 scientists re-affirmed their assertion that HIV causes AIDS and endorsed the Durban Declaration at the AIDS 2000 conference yesterday. (Thursday).
Read More »Scientists re-affrim assertion that HIV causes AIDSDURBAN - The South African government should be in a position to make a decision about the provision of Nevirapine to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS by this afternoon. (Friday)
Read More »Government should decide on Nevirapine by the end of the conference – Coovadia"Nobody says we shouldn't treat TB or cancer because we don't have the infrastructure or the ability to do so properly," said Dr Andy Grey from the Health System Trust in Durban. This was in response to Dr Mazuwa Banda from the World Health Organization, who argued at the AIDS 2000 conference that antiretroviral drugs should not be distributed in countries where "the basic requirements for [their] safe, effective use" are not in place.
Read More »Drugs are the bottom-lineDURBAN - The Medical Research Council of South Africa has received more than R100 million over five years to establish two new research units for the study of HIV/AIDS prevention strategies and vaccines.
Read More »MRC receives R100-m boostDURBAN - If access to HIV treatment does not exist, should government's promote voluntary testing and counselling among its citizens? This was one of the issues debated at the AIDS 2000 conference this week.
Read More »Testing for HIV/AIDS – what’s the point?For many young people, resigned to a life with few opportunities and a future without promise, sex is one of life's few pleasures. But their lack of faith in the future means that many are not bothering to practice safe sex.
Read More »Safe sex undermined by pessimism
