IRIN HIV/AIDS Weekly - 81
Africa
31 May 2002


NEWS:

SOUTH AFRICA: Community health care serves the people
ANGOLA: Waking up to HIV/AIDS
ANGOLA: HIV/AIDS training for journalists
BENIN: National commission against HIV/AIDS inaugrated
KENYA: Soccer tournament highlights plight of street children
ZIMBABWE: State declares emergency, allows use of generics
ZAMBIA: Kaunda soldiers on in anti-AIDS campaign
SWAZILAND: AIDS campaign to be led from the grassroots

LINKS:

1. Speakout - rape and post exposure HIV prophylaxis
2. The Regional AIDS Training Network (RATN)
3. Health Gap Coalition
4. HIV/AIDS in Africa - Info to go

CONFERENCES/RESEARCH/EVENTS:

1. The First African AIDS Vaccine Programme Forum
2. HIV/AIDS and Human Rights
3. Economics of the AIDS Epidemic in Africa

SOUTH AFRICA: Community health care serves the people

The HIV/AIDS pandemic in KwaZulu Natal is overwhelming some public
hospitals' capacity to provide adequate care for patients living with
HIV/AIDS. The solution to this lies in community-driven health-care
projects, local health workers told PlusNews.

More Details:
http://www.irinnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=1321

ANGOLA: Waking up to HIV/AIDS

Three pm on a Monday. It is hot and dusty in the sprawling shantytown of
Rocha Pinto near Luanda's airport, but dark and cool inside Chico's Bar. A
soft kizomba is on the sound system. A teenage girl dances alone, eyes
closed, with small movements.

She seems absorbed, but shows off her lithe body in hip-hugging jeans and
skimpy top. A sprinkle of men, seated at several tables, drink beer and
watch her.

More details:
http://www.irinnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=1319

ANGOLA: HIV/AIDS training for journalists

A network of Angolan journalists concerned about HIV/AIDS is taking shape,
following a workshop on reporting on HIV/AIDS held in Luanda last month,
the first such training to take place in Angola.

Twenty journalists, half from the provinces and half from the capital,
attended the 15-18 May workshop sponsored by the UN agencies UNAIDS and
UNICEF under the "Telling the Story" (TTS) project. TTS focuses especially
on youth and HIV/AIDS and is supported by grants from CNN mogul Ted
Turner's United Nations Foundation, which targets seven countries in
Southern Africa, where the pandemic is most serious.

More details:
http://www.irinnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=1315

BENIN: National commission against HIV/AIDS inaugurated

The government of Benin and its UN partners have inaugurated the country's
National Commission against AIDS (Comite National de lutte contre le
sida), the World Health Organization said on Wednesday.

The commission's main task will be to support and supplement the work of
the National Programme Against AIDS, including drafting "concrete action
plans (and) mobilising communities and technical resources" in the fight
against AIDS, WHO-Benin said.

The National Programme Against AIDS, drafted in 1987, represents the
country's most important mechanism in the fight against HIV/AIDS, and the
authorities hope the advent of the commission will create a much-needed
and more effective symbiosis in tackling HIV/AIDS and other sexually
transmitted diseases.

Benin has initiated several national and international projects, including
the Corridor project which is a surveillance programme running from Cote
d'Ivoire to Nigeria. According to the UN 2001 human development report,
about 2.45 percent of Beninese aged 15 to 49 years old are HIV positive.
Benin's total population is around six million.

KENYA: Soccer tournament highlights plight of street children

Hundreds of Kenyan slum and street children on Thursday thronged the
National Stadium in Nairobi, the Kenyan capital, to take part in the
finals of a month-long soccer tournament, as part of a concerted
initiative launched this year to combat drug abuse and sexually
transmitted diseases (STDs), including HIV/AIDS, among these high-risk
youth.

The campaign, Exodus from the Street, intends to bring the plight of
street children into the focus of the public and policy-makers, and to
raise awareness among the youth on reproductive health.

More details:
http://www.irinnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=1320

ZIMBABWE: State declares emergency, allows use of generics

Zimbabwe's government has declared a state of emergency over HIV/AIDS and
will allow the importation and manufacture of generic drugs, a local
state-controlled newspaper reported.

However, Lindy Francis, director of The Centre, an NGO working with people
living with AIDS (PWAs) in Harare said that if true, the declaration was
"five years too late".

More details:
http://www.irinnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=1318

ZAMBIA: Kaunda soldiers on in anti-AIDS campaign

Zambia's first president Kenneth Kaunda was commander-in-chief of the
armed forces for close to three decades. Today, in his retirement years,
he is marshalling the country in a war against HIV/AIDS.

"I have declared a war (on AIDS) and at 78-years-old, I am its strongest
and fiercest enemy. I will look AIDS in the face and say, 'I will fight
you with every ounce of energy'. I am like a mad man because I see the
devastation. I want to stop this scourge before it annihilates mankind,"
he told PlusNews

More details:
http://www.irinnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=1316

SWAZILAND: AIDS campaign to be led from the grassroots

Swaziland's mayors are adopting a novel method in the fight against
HIV/AIDS. They are reversing the usual top-down approach and are being led
instead by their constituents, ordinary Swazis.

"The voice of the people will determine how we will combat AIDS in the
towns," explained chairman of the Ezulwini town board, Nokuthula Mthembu.
The first woman to hold the top government post in her municipality,
Mthembu is chair of the Executive Council of the Alliance of Mayors'
Initiative for Community Action on AIDS at the Local Level (AMICAALL).

More details:
http://www.irinnews.org/AIDSReport.ASP?ReportID=1317


LINKS:

1. Speakout. A South African site with information on rape and
post-exposure HIV prophylaxis
http://www.speakout.org.za

2. The Regional AIDS Training Network (RATN) is a Network of training
institutions in the Eastern and Southern Africa (ESA) region.
http://www.ratn.org/

3. Health Global Access Project Coalition is an organisation of AIDS and
human rights activists, people living with HIV/AIDS, public health
experts, fair trade advocates and concerned individuals who campaign
against eliminating barriers to global access to affordable
life-sustaining medicines for people living with HIV/AIDS.
http://www.healthgap.org/

4. Info-To-Go is designed to organise and present all the John Hopkins
Centre for Communication Programmes online resources on a single topic. It
provides images of posters, photos and other visual materials related to
HIV/AIDS in Africa. The website contains links to the latest documents
about HIV/AIDS.
http://www.jhuccp.org/info_to_go/aids_africa/index.stm


CONFERENCES/RESEARCH/EVENTS:

1. The First African AIDS Vaccine Programme (AAVP) Forum Cape Town, South
Africa, 3-4 June, 2002

The WHO-UNAIDS HIV Vaccine Initiative is organising the First African AIDS
Vaccine Programme (AAVP) Forum which is planned to be held at the Golden
Tulip The Lord Charles Hotel, Cape Town, South Africa on 3-4 June 2002.

The African AIDS Vaccine Programme (AAVP) is a network of scientists,
working to promote and facilitate HIV vaccine research and evaluation in
Africa, through capacity building and regional and international
collaboration. The principal objective of this programme is to actively
involve African scientists and communities in all stages of HIV vaccine
development and evaluation.

At the end of the Forum, the following outcome is expected:

- Increased awareness of HIV vaccine research in Africa
- Committed support from stakeholders and interested parties for
  collaborative research
- Opportunities for new funding
- Broader participation of all stakeholders and interested parties in
  AAVP activities

For more information contact:
Daniela Bagozzi, WHO, Geneva
Tel: +41 22 791 45 44 or +41 79 475 54 90 or
Merle May, Medical Research Council, Cape Town
Tel: +27 21 938 0241 or +27 82 459 3060.

2. International Council of AIDS Service Organisations (ICASO) this week
announced the release of its new research report, "The International
Guidelines on HIV/AIDS and Human Rights: How are they being used and
applied?"

The report is an assessment of national efforts to improve access to
HIV/AIDS treatment within the framework of the International Guidelines on
HIV/AIDS and Human Rights, and the role played by community groups. It
analyses the responses of 15 governments and the participation of
community groups in those responses, as well as overall awareness of the
International Guidelines.

"The International Guidelines on HIV/AIDS and Human Rights: How are they
being used and applied" is available at www.icaso.org/docs/ighr.pdf

3. New Papers on the Economics of the AIDS Epidemic in Africa on Boston
University's School of Public Health website - The Centre for
International Health at the Boston University School of Public Health has
recently posted a number of papers on the economics of the AIDS epidemic
in Africa on their website.
For more information: http://www.international-health.org/AIDS_economics/


IRIN-SA
Tel: +27 11 880-4633
Fax: +27 11 447-5472
Email: IRIN-SA@irin.org.za

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