In this audio feature we meet some of the people who seldom make the news headlines, but who make all the difference to those people who are bed-ridden with AIDS-related diseases.
Although South Africa does not feature prominently in UNICEF's State of the World's Children report, statistics reveal how the country is performing.
Since 1959, Cuba has incrementally built a national system of day-care centres and early childhood and pre-school education programmes that today reaches 98,3% of the children in the 0-6 age group. This policy is now being hailed as a true investment in the future of the country's children. Anso Thom reports
"It is deeply ironic that despite widespread concern about the lack of sustainable development in numerous countries around the world, government leaders, policy makers and development agents seem blinded to the one investment opportunity with almost guaranteed returns '€“ ensuring children start a good life." This is how the United Nation Children'€™s Fund (UNICEF) summarises "The State of the World'€™s Children" in its 2001 report. By Anso Thom
Several short films about innovative health care projects won recognition at the the South African National Television and Video Association awards ceremony recently. Top honours went to "Hero of the Hills", a video about the Transnet Phelophepa train which has been delivering health care to remote communities for the past four years.
A British study shows that the chronic use of pain killers commonly used for arthritis leads to the death of some two thousand patients each year. South African specialists confirm these findings.
While some might baulk at an annual figure of US $3 billion suggested by UNAIDS to combat HIV/AIDS in Africa, this amount is a mere fraction of the $52 billion the United States spends each year treating people for the medical consequences of being overweight.
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.
The impact of HIV/AIDS on the generation of young parents has resulted in many grandparents assuming responsibility for their orphaned grandchildren. Effective programmes of treatment and care would not only enable parents to live longer, healthier lives, they can also reduce the rate of mother to child transmission of HIV and ensure the birth of healthier children who do not need constant medical care.
South Africa has the largest HIV/AIDS population in the world and one of the fastest growing epidemics, with one in four women between the ages of 20 and 29 already infected with the virus. However, for the first time there are signs that HIV incidence '€“ the annual number of new infections - may have stabilised in parts of sub-Saharan Africa. JO STEIN reports.
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.
Will South Africa be able to stem the tide before it is too late? Will the country show a commitment towards finding innovative ways to treat the already more than four million people living with HIV/AIDS or providing a sanctuary for the millions of orphans that will result from the epidemic? Or will our response continue to be questions related to the link between HIV and AIDS, the toxicity of drugs such as AZT or the vested interests of the drug companies. Anso Thom reports
In a wide-ranging, exclusive interview, Dr Nono Simelela, head of government'€™s HIV/AIDS Directorate, spells out to Kerry Cullinan how government is fighting the epidemic.
On World AIDS Day (Dec.1) paediatricians throughout the country launched a protest campaign against government'€™s failure to fast-track plans to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV.An estimated 200 HIV positive babies are born every day in South Africa, but this figure could be halved if all HIV positive mothers were given anti-retroviral drugs during pregnancy and labour. KERRY CULLINAN reports.
Today (Dec1) paediatricians throughout the country are launching a protest campaign against government?s failure to fast-track plans to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV.An estimated 200 HIV positive babies are born every day in South Africa, but this figure could be halved if all HIV positive mothers were given anti-retroviral drugs during pregnancy and labour. KERRY CULLINAN reports.
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