IRIN HIV/AIDS Weekly - 228
Africa
8 April 2005


NEWS:

AFRICA: Generic drug company offers anti-AIDS drugs to MSF

Subject: IRIN PlusNews Weekly Issue 228, 8 April 2005


AFRICA: IRIN PlusNews Weekly Issue 228, 8 April 2005

NEWS

CONGO: Government regulates ARV supply
GHANA: Local employers start to care for their HIV-positive staff
LESOTHO: The need for treatment could jeopardise the quality of care
LESOTHO: Abused child domestic workers even more vulnerable to HIV/AIDS
SENEGAL: AIDS takes hold in pilgrim town of Touba
SOUTH AFRICA: Shared breastfeeding and poor medical hygiene fuels HIV/AIDS
SOUTH AFRICA: Initiative to alleviate effect of AIDS education
SWAZILAND: HIV prevalence rate among pregnant women rises
SWAZILAND: Call for regional women's organisation to combat HIV/AIDS
SWAZILAND: Health workers score with TB campaign
ZIMBABWE: Govt plans to replace DOT
ZIMBABWE: Global Fund grant to come through, finally


LINKS

1. HIV pharmacogenomics website launched

CONFERENCES/ EVENTS/ RESEARCH/ RESOURCES

1. WHO World Health report 2005
2. Sex and reproductive health for HIV-positive women
3. HIV/AIDS training course for journalists


VACANCIES

1. Director - Geneva office for the Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS


NEWS

CONGO: Government regulates ARV supply

The Republic of Congo (ROC) has conducted an audit of all pharmaceutical 
laboratories in the country in a bid to resolve a shortage of 
antiretroviral drugs (ARVs) for HIV-positive patients, the government 
has announced.

In a statement issued on Friday at the end of the first steering 
committee meeting of the National Council for the Fight Against AIDS and 
Sexually Transmitted Diseases, or CNLS, the government said it "started 
the payment of all the invoices concerning the supply of the ARVs and 
made provisions which are essential so that the situation is never 
repeated".

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4673


GHANA: Local employers start to care for their HIV-positive staff

The world fell apart for Ghanaian primary school teacher Haruna Ibn 
Hassan three years ago when his wife died of AIDS and he found that he 
too had contracted the disease.

But at least Hassan kept his job and his sympathetic headmaster 
reassigned him to administrative tasks that allowed him to take more 
time off to receive treatment.

At the time Hassan discovered that he was infected with the HI virus, 
his employer, the Ghana Education Service had yet to develop a clear 
policy for dealing with AIDS in the workplace.

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4679&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=GHANA


LESOTHO: The need for treatment could jeopardise the quality of care

A storm is quietly brewing in Lesotho after international media reports 
raised concerns that private doctors were dispensing anti-AIDS drugs 
without specialised training - putting the lives of many HIV-positive 
people at risk.

Recent news reports have claimed that some doctors were prescribing only 
part of the regimen, or failing to monitor patients adequately for 
adherence, resistance and side effects, and sometimes not providing 
enough counselling.

While government officials in the tiny kingdom have dismissed the 
reports as anecdotal, the articles have served as a wake-up call for 
developing countries to turn their attention to the quality of AIDS care 
being delivered in the private sector.

Beneath the hype surrounding these reports, a quiet revolution has been 
taking place. More and more Basotho living with HIV/AIDS are turning 
their backs on state facilities, preferring the relative anonymity of 
private healthcare practitioners.

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4677


LESOTHO: Abused child domestic workers even more vulnerable to HIV/AIDS

The exploitation of children employed as domestic workers in the tiny 
kingdom of Lesotho has, until now, been shrouded in secrecy. But as the 
kingdom grapples with high HIV/AIDS figures and growing levels of 
poverty, a new report is forcing people to confront the risk of child 
abuse, when employing young domestic workers.

According to the study, commissioned by the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) 
and the Ministry of Gender and Youth, Sports and Recreation (MOGYSR), 
child domestic workers were poorly paid, often worked in isolated and 
difficult living conditions, and vulnerable to sexual abuse.

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4665


SENEGAL: AIDS takes hold in pilgrim town of Touba

Senegal has one of the lowest HIV infection rates in Africa, but the 
central town of Touba, a Muslim shrine where over one million people 
gathered last week, is a hotspot where prevalence rates have shot well 
above the national average.

"We don't know exactly what the HIV prevalence rate is in Touba, but it 
is considerably higher than the national average of 1.5 percent," Doctor 
Mamadou Dieng, who works in a health centre in Touba, told PlusNews.

"Right now, we're testing some 50 people a month and at least 10 of them 
are HIV-positive," he said.

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4666


SOUTH AFRICA: Shared breastfeeding and poor medical hygiene fuels 
HIV/AIDS

New research by South Africa's Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) 
suggests that negligent breastfeeding at public hospitals in the Free 
State province is placing infants at risk of HIV infection.

Besides the obvious route of mother-to-child transmission, shared 
breastfeeding emerged as the single most important factor associated 
with child HIV infection in the study commissioned by the Nelson Mandela 
Foundation and released at the current Seventh International AIDS Impact 
Conference in Cape Town.

"A major problem was that bottles were labelled by cot numbers - rather 
than by the name of the baby - and rarely checked, allowing milk to be 
fed to the wrong baby if the cot was moved. This suggests that even if 
children are born free of HIV, they are likely to contract the virus 
through breastfeeding," Dr Olive Shisana, executive director of Social 
Aspects of HIV/AIDS and Health at the HSRC, told PlusNews.

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4674&SelectRegion=Southern_Africa&SelectCountry=SOUTH_AFRICA


SOUTH AFRICA: Initiative to alleviate effect of AIDS education

A group of eight South African and international NGOs are collaborating 
on a new programme to tackle the impact of HIV/AIDS on the education 
sector, after recent research showed that the pandemic was claiming the 
lives of 11 teachers daily.

The Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) surveyed a nationally 
representative sample of 17,088 teachers at 1,700 schools and found that 
most of the affected teachers were aged between 25 and 44.

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4682


SWAZILAND: HIV prevalence rate among pregnant women rises

Swaziland's government said it would act urgently to reverse the rising 
HIV prevalence rate among pregnant women, currently at 42.6 percent 
according to the latest sentinel survey.

The Ministry of Health and Social Welfare highlighted the prevalence 
rate among pregnant women, up from 38.6 percent in 2002, as a key area 
of concern.

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4670


SWAZILAND: Call for regional women's organisation to combat HIV/AIDS

Former South African first lady Graca Machel has called on women in 
southern Africa to tackle traditional practices that may contribute to 
the spread of HIV/AIDS.

Addressing delegates from the region at a gender equality conference in 
Ezulwini, just outside Swaziland's capital, Mbabane, Machel highlighted 
the impact of the virus on women. "We are the ones who are most affected 
by AIDS: of the people infected with HIV, 58 percent are women; of the 
people dying of AIDS, 58 percent are women - it is time to say, 
'enough!'"

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4675


SWAZILAND: Health workers score with TB campaign

A tuberculosis (TB) treatment programme recently introduced in Swaziland 
is credited with lowering the number of TB patients, at a time when 
other African nations face a rising number of cases.

Dumsile Nxumalo, the first Swazi to participate in the Directly Observed 
Treatment Short-course (DOTS) TB programme, believes she is alive today 
because of the initiative.

"My mother still had hope when I had given up, which is what I ask all 
families to do. Do not give up on your family members who have TB, 
because it makes them believe that there is nothing left for them 
anymore," Nxumalo testified this week at a health workers conference on 
DOTS.

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4681


ZIMBABWE: Govt plans to replace DOTS

Zimbabwe plans to introduce a new combination of drugs to treat 
tuberculosis (TB) early next year, an official in the Ministry of Health 
and Child Welfare told PlusNews.

Owen Mugurungi, a senior officer with the ministry's HIV/AIDS and 
tuberculosis programme, told IRIN that the Fixed Combination Dose (FDS) 
would replace the existing Directly Observed Treatment Short-course 
(DOTS) strategy.

"The new dose will combine a number of the tablets that patients are 
currently taking separately, to produce one powerful combination that 
will be tolerable to patients and more effective in combating all TB 
strains," Mugurungi explained.

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4676


ZIMBABWE: Global Fund grant to come through, finally

After a three-year delay, a US $10.3 million grant to Zimbabwe by the 
Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria is "very close to 
signing", an official told PlusNews on Monday.

"The grant had been approved in principal when Zimbabwe had applied for 
it in 2002 - unfortunately, there were delays. We are now just waiting 
for some minor technical details to be addressed," said Jon Liden, 
spokesman for the Global Fund.

More details:
http://www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp?ReportID=4664



LINKS

1. A new website highlighting developments in HIV pharmacogenomics has 
been launched, in a collaboration between pharmacology groups at the 
University of Liverpool, Vanderbilt University in the United States and 
the University of Lausanne in Switzerland.

Analysis of the interaction between genes and drugs, known as 
pharmacogenomics, is an accelerating field of research, and the 
website's editors believe that, over the coming years, increased 
knowledge in this field will drive clinical management towards the goal 
of individualised therapy for all patients. The site includes a list of 
recent publications with links to journal abstracts, and will also 
include a library of information on HIV pharmacogenomics.

www.hiv-pharmacogenomics.org



CONFERENCES/ EVENTS/ RESEARCH/ RESOURCES

1. The World Health Day 2005 theme 'Make every mother and child count' 
aims to raise awareness on the grave situation that mothers and children 
still face today.

Hundreds of millions of women and children have no access to potentially 
life-saving care with often fatal results, the World Health Organisation 
(WHO) said in a report published this week. The report says the 
resulting death toll could be sharply reduced through wider use of key 
interventions and a "continuum of care" approach for mother and child 
that begins before pregnancy and extends through childbirth and into the 
baby's childhood.

In The World Health Report 2005, WHO estimates that out of a total of 
136 million births a year worldwide, less than two thirds of women in 
less developed countries and only one third in the least developed 
countries have their babies delivered by a skilled attendant. The report 
says this can make the difference between life and death for mother and 
child if complications arise.

To access the report: http://www.who.int/whr/2005/en/index.html

2. From 4 April - 27 May 2005, UNFPA and EngenderHealth, in 
collaboration with the International Community of Women Living with 
HIV/AIDS (ICW), Ipas, and the Programme on International Health and 
Human Rights at Harvard's FXB Center for Health and Human Rights will be 
hosting an eight-week electronic forum focused on sexual and 
reproductive health policies and services and human rights of 
HIV-positive women, including young women.

The electronic forum is part of a two year UNFPA/EngenderHealth global 
project aimed at developing improved approaches to address the sexual 
and reproductive health (SRH) needs of HIV-positive women.

For more information on the E-Forum areas of discussion: 
http://66.147.176.110/index.php?id=88

3. A training workshop in Botswana will help Southern African 
journalists understand plans to release antiretroviral (ARV) drugs, as 
well as other topics related to the fight against HIV/AIDS.

This technical training workshop is intended for health and social 
justice reporters in countries of the Southern African Development 
Community (SADC). The NSJ Media Training Trust is conducting the 
intensive workshop, scheduled for 11 - 22 July 2005. Deadline for 
applications: 6 June 2005.

The aim of the course is to help reporters critically analyse and report 
on efforts to roll out ARVs to the public, as well as the politics and 
management of those efforts. Participants will examine aspects of their 
watchdog and educational roles by studying new health policies and 
programmes, while also interacting with health professionals, government 
agencies, politicians and others.

The NSJ Trust is an independent training institute jointly owned by 
several African media NGOs and associated journalism schools in the 
Southern African and Nordic regions.

For more information:
Email: contact nsj@nsjtraining.org
Tel: +258 1 493400
Fax: +258 1 490880
http://www.nsjtraining.org



VACANCIES

Director - Geneva office for the Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS

As of 21 March 2005, The Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS will be 
the Focal Point for the Private Sector Delegation at the Global Fund to 
fight HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. As Focal Point, it will serve 
as a secretariat for the Private Sector Constituency worldwide to 
increase the quality and quantity of private sector involvement in the 
Global Fund.



RESPONSIBILITIES:

- Coordinate all aspects of private sector participation in the Global 
Fund Board meetings and other deliberations

- Coordinate the development of private sector policy positions and 
shepherd them through the Global Fund policy processes

- Work to expand the range of companies engaged with the Global Fund, 
with particular emphasis on increasing private sector participation at 
the country level including grant proposals and implementation 
(including co-investment)

- Coordinate with other Global Fund delegations and constituents, and 
with the Fund's Secretariat

- Work with Geneva-based organisations such as UNAIDS, WHO and other 
institutions, Global Health Initiative and major NGOs.

For more information:
http://www.fpa.org/jobs_contact2423/jobs_contact_show.htm?doc_id=269574


IRIN-SA
Tel: +27 11 895-1900
Fax: +27 11 784-6759
Email: IRIN-SA@irin.org.za

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2005


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