Years of digging for gold at Anglo-American mines have left Zonesele Blom with an incurable lung disease, called silicosis. His health has deteriorated to such a degree that he is no longer fit to work.

OPINION: Surveys have consistently shown that over 40% of Americans do not believe in evolution. It is not surprising, then, that our society is vulnerable to being fooled by people who misrepresent scientific or historical facts. By Dr. J.P. Moore, PHD.

Thanks to the international recession, donors are either decreasing or opting not to increase their funding of AIDS treatment. This will have devastating effects on poorer countries that are largely dependent on foreign aid.

Years of working as a professional nurse have convinced Seobi Matube that having more than one sexual partner is a sure way of getting HIV.

PARIS - A shortage of money is threatening the AIDS battle at the very time when progress is being made against the epidemic and vaccine research is showing promise.

The 2008 antenatal clinic survey, which measures the prevalence levels of HIV amongst pregnant women attending public health care facilities, shows that HIV in this group is not declining.

Less than half of adults and children needing antiretroviral treatment (ART) in sub-Saharan Africa - where two-thirds of all global HIV infections occur - are receiving it. This is despite the region showing the greatest gains worldwide in terms of access to the lifesaving drugs.

With the economy in a recession, fears abound that government funding of major health programmes, including HIV/AIDS, could diminish. But the country cannot afford to let its citizens go without much-needed treatment, warns the head of the South African National AIDS Council (SANAC).

Dr Jorge Sampaio, the United Nations Special Envoy on Tuberculosis recently addressed the 59th World Health Organisation Regional Committee for Africa in Kigali, Rwanda. He reminded ministers that putting money in TB is one of the most cost effective public health investments.

NAIROBI: (PlusNews) - AIDS activists have praised a decision by the Indian patent office to reject patent applications for two life-prolonging antiretroviral (ARV) drugs, allowing Indian manufacturers to keep on making and exporting generic versions.

JOHANNESBURG: (PlusNews) - An attempt to help educators around the world develop sex-education programmes as a way to reduce unwanted pregnancies and the spread of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among young people has become bogged down in controversy.

NAIROBI: (PlusNews) - Shortages of medical staff in Uganda mean clinical officers, nurses and midwives are prescribing life-prolonging antiretroviral therapy (ART) without proper training, a new studyreveals.

JOHANNESBURG: (PlusNews) - A new book has broken the silence over what really goes on during traditional male circumcisions in South Africa, and the author, a former initiate, says that if is to be made safer and punted to prevent HIV, circumcision as many know it will have to change.