An ambitious new Global Malaria Action Plan aimed at reducing the number of malaria deaths to near zero by 2015 was revealed in New York yesterday (Thursday) with world leaders committing nearly US$3-billion to ensure it succeeds.
The high mortality rate in children under the age of five years might soon be a thing of the past. This follows the announcement by the Department of Health that it will roll-out Prevenar, a vaccine that prevents pneumococcus pneumonia, one of the leading causes of child deaths.
The opposition has hit out against the about turn by the ANC members in the health committee who last week rejected the minister'€™s two-tier medicines registration system, but are now supporting it.
Films showing real-life experiences that put us at risk of HIV infection and how people are dealing with the epidemic have been produced for television. The nine short films were produced by film-makers from nine countries in southern Africa.
The health department has withdrawn two widely-dispensed tuberculosis (TB) drug combination batches after preliminary investigations revealed the drugs became unstable under long-term storage, ultimately placing patients at risk of not receiving their optimal dosage.
A key feature of South Africa'€™s HIV epidemic where 5.7 million people are positive is that among the 15 '€“ 24 year olds infected, women and girls account for more than 90% of new infections. This needs a special focus on this group when designing prevention programmes, says UNAIDS.
MEXICO CITY -- Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka has appealed to all South Africans attending the 17th International AIDS Conference to come home and make HIV prevention work.
Festus Mogae recruits prominent African "champions for an AIDS-free generation" to help improve HIV prevention efforts.
After a series of failed AIDS vaccines, there is hope that ARVs taken before potentially risky sex, could protect those who don't have HIV.
The Joint United Nations'€™ Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) annual report shows that the global HIV epidemic is either slightly stabilising or decreasing. The stabilising epidemic has also been noted in South Africa which has the world'€™s largest HIV epidemic with 5.7 million infections.
The Department of Health is expected to change its guidelines on AIDS treatment to allow people with a CD4 cell count higher than 200 to qualify for antiretroviral therapy.
Cape Town researchers have announced plans to launch a pre-exposure prophylaxis (Prep) HIV prevention trial among men in the city.
South Africa'€™s more standardized HIV treatment approach in the public sector is as effective as the more individualized approach in Switzerland a comparative study has shown.
DURBAN - South African health workers should become more afraid of tuberculosis (TB) and the impact it is having on health resources and people living with HIV, infectious diseases expert Professor Anton Stoltz has told the opening session of the country'€™s first TB conference.
In a breakthrough which will have a major impact on curbing the spread of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) in developing countries, including South Africa, the endemic disease will in future be diagnosed within a day and not the standard two to three months, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has announced.
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