PITTSBURGH (AP) - Five days after undergoing a liver transplant, AIDS activist and author Larry Kramer s condition was upgraded to fair on Wednesday and he was moved from intensive care. A spokeswoman at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center said Kramer was moved to a private room in the liver transplant inpatien
PITTSBURGH (AP) - AIDS activist, author and playwright Larry Kramer underwent liver transplantation surgery and was listed in serious condition Monday. Kramer s doctors said his condition was improving and was about where it should be after the 12-hour surgery Friday. Kramer, 66, spent seven months on the University of
TRIPOLI, Libya (AP) - A Libyan court postponed its verdict Saturday in the case of six Bulgarians and a Palestinian, all doctors and nurses, accused of injecting 393 children with HIV-contaminated blood. It was the second time in four months the judges had postponed their verdict. They were originally due to hand down
SAN FRANCISCO -- The California AIDS Ride, a feel-good event in which 11,000 cyclists have raised $40 million since 1994, is being abandoned by the nonprofit agencies it benefits. They say it is unacceptable they get only 50 cents of every dollar raised. Cyclists from all over the country have joined the annual ride fr
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) - The South African government announced Wednesday that it will challenge a court order to widen access to a key AIDS drug, saying the ruling may infringe on its constitutional right to determine policy. The Pretoria High Court ordered the government Friday to institute a comprehensive prog
CHICAGO (AP) - A disturbing new study found that at least half of all Americans under care for HIV infection carry viruses that are resistant to some of the standard AIDS drugs. HIV s relentless ability to mutate and grow impervious to AIDS drugs is the single biggest challenge of treatment, and the new research shows
OUAGADOUGOU, Burkina Faso -- Two African countries are negotiating with Thailand s government to learn how to produce cheap, generic anti-HIV drugs on Africa, the continent hardest-hit by AIDS, the World Health Organization says. Zimbabwe and Ghana are mak
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) - The South African government s muddled AIDS policy took a major blow Friday when a court ruled that it must make a key AIDS drug available to HIV-positive pregnant women. Doctors say the drug could save the lives of 50,000 newborns a year. The Pretoria High Court said the government not on
HONOLULU (AP) - The families of two Samoan women who passed on knowledge of a tree s healing powers will share in profits from any AIDS drug developed from the rainforest plant. In an agreement announced Thursday, the nonprofit AIDS ReSearch Alliance promised to give the government of Samoa and the healers 20 percent o
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) - AIDS activists and pediatricians won a landmark lawsuit against the government Friday, forcing it to provide a key drug to expectant mothers infected with HIV. Activists who packed the court gallery cheered and hugged each other as Judge Chris Botha read a brief judgment stating that the g
WASHINGTON (AP) - Researchers have cured laboratory mice of sickle cell anemia, the inherited blood disorder that affects more than 70,000 Americans, in an experiment using stem cells, genes and a modified HIV virus. Although the treatment is years away from being tested on humans, experts called the experiment a miles
WASHINGTON (AP) - The House approved the spending of $1.3 billion to fight the global epidemic of AIDS through bilateral and multinational programs aimed at education, prevention, treatment and research. The funds, approved by voice vote Tuesday, are double what is budgeted for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, but Ho
LAGOS, Nigeria -- A long-awaited program using cheap generic drugs to treat AIDS was delayed Monday for the second time this fall, leaving millions of Nigerians wondering when they could begin treatment. Only 10,000 adults and 5,000 children out of the 3.5 million Nigerians said to have AIDS will be covered by the tria
OUAGADOUGOU, Burkina Faso (AP) - Burkina Faso s president appealed Sunday for a new solidarity between the world s wealthy and impoverished nations to fight AIDS in Africa - the continent hardest-hit by the disease. President Blaise Compaore s comments came as experts from around the world met in the capital, Ouagadoug
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - Private foundations joined those of the United Nations on Friday to pledge $100 million over the next five years to improve treatment of mothers with HIV. To date, treatment of women who were pregnant and HIV-positive had focused on preventing transmission of the disease to the baby, which happens
WASHINGTON (AP) - Garlic supplements, often taken in hopes of lowering cholesterol, can seriously interfere with drugs used to treat the AIDS virus, a new federal study concludes. The study makes garlic the second popular herbal remedy found to interact dangerously with prescription drugs. Experts already warn that St.
WASHINGTON (AP) - It may be possible for AIDS patients on a powerful drug combination to take weeklong medication vacations and still control HIV, while cutting costs by half and reducing serious side effects, a study suggests. Federal researchers, whose findings appeared Tuesday in the Proceedings of the National Acad
SAN FRANCISCO -- Jim Greenshields always adds a spoonful of laughter, some love and understanding to every recipe he prepares for terminally ill patients, most with AIDS. Saturday, World AIDS Day, Greenshields received the fourth annual Grove Award in recognition of his 17 years working for the AIDS community. He has s
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) - Nelson Mandela, the former president of a country now beset by a deadly AIDS epidemic, commemorated World AIDS Day Saturday by urging South Africa s youth to fight the disease and accept those who suffer from it. There is no difference whatsoever between somebody who is HIV-positive and m
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) - When a critically ill AIDS patient comes to Philippe Castera, the voodoo priest consults with the spirits and often tells the patient to lie in a coffin for 24 hours. The treatment isn t intended to attack the virus but the evil spirit believed to be causing the illness. Seeing the patient,
NEW YORK (AP) - Thousands of children with HIV or AIDS may not receive Christmas gifts this year because the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center displaced an organization that collects toys for them. For a month after the Sept. 11 attack, the Children s Hope Foundation was forced out of its office three blocks f
While other children are outside playing, Maggie Ubisi has more weighty things to deal with. The 14-year-old has to cook for her brothers and sister, clean their shack, listen to their problems. AIDS not only stole Maggie s mother from her in July, it also stole her childhood, forcing her to become a teen-age matriarch
SAN FRANCISCO -- They were walking corpses, the once-beautiful men who dragged themselves to pray at the Metropolitan Community Church, draping their gaunt, lesion-covered bodies across the pews. During each sermon, the Rev. Jim Mitulski would survey his Castro District congregation, wondering whom he would have to bur
MORRISVILLE, N.C. (AP) - An artist has been working 21-hour days in the past three weeks as he puts the finishing touches on a mammoth painting in honor of children affected by AIDS and HIV. Eric Waugh has been working for five years on Hero, a painting that will stand twice as tall as the Statue of Liberty when all th
ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) - Nigeria will start distributing free generic drugs to some AIDS sufferers on Dec. 10, the government announced Friday. The long-awaited program, hailed as one of the most ambitious to date in Africa, is expected to cover 10,000 adults and 5,000 children in its first year, a government statement sa
ATLANTA (AP) - Only about half the people at highest risk for HIV have been tested, suggesting U.S. infection rates could be higher than health experts thought, government researchers said Thursday. Just 54 percent of people who reported being at high or medium risk said they had been tested for the virus that causes A
LONDON (AP) - Britons have more sexual partners, more homosexual encounters and indulge in more two-timing than they did a decade ago, a survey of British sexual habits has found. The survey, which gives the clearest picture to date of the sex lives of Britons, is published this week in The Lancet medical journal.
MOSCOW (AP) - The AIDS epidemic is sweeping across Eastern Europe, with HIV infection rates rising faster within the former Soviet Union than anywhere else in the world, according to the latest U.N. report on AIDS. The report was published Wednesday. The combination of economic insecurity, high unemployment and deterio
ATLANTA (AP) - Syphilis infections dropped to an all-time low in the United States last year, with fewer than 6,000 cases of the sexually transmitted disease reported nationwide, the government said Wednesday. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said it recorded 5,979 cases, down nearly 10 percent from 1999.
CHICAGO (AP) - Symptom-free HIV patients can safely hold off taking AIDS drugs longer than previously thought, two new studies suggest. When antiretroviral drugs first became available in the mid-1990s, their dramatic effects prompted many doctors to recommend immediate treatment for all HIV patients to keep the virus
WASHINGTON (AP) - The World Bank said Tuesday it would consider providing another $500 million in no-interest loans to help developing countries combat HIV and AIDS. The announcement came in advance of World AIDS Day on Saturday. The 183-nation lending organization said the loans would go to African countries, home to
SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) - Many American Indians infected with HIV/AIDS aren t treated for the disease because of the stigma surrounding it in their communities, members of an Indian group said at an annual meeting Tuesday. Poverty, isolation and poor medical care also contribute to the spread of HIV and AIDS among Indians,
NEW YORK (AP) The number of people in poor countries taking Merck & Co. s AIDS drugs has grown 40 percent to 70,000 since the company began selling its medicines at cost to those nations nine months ago. Still, that number, announced Monday, is only a fraction of those who need to be taking the medicine, said an ad
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) - Pregnant HIV-positive women have no inherent right to a key AIDS drug that could save their babies from the deadly disease, lawyers for the South African government argued Tuesday. AIDS activists and pediatricians have sued the state in a bid to force it to make the drug
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) - Providing a powerful AIDS drugs to all HIV-positive pregnant women could spare the lives of thousands of children, lawyers for AIDS activists argued in court Monday. Nearly 200 babies are born in South Africa with HIV every day, and studies indicate that the drug
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Busisiwe Maqungo s daughter died the same year she was born, infected with the HIV virus at birth. Maqungo said the drug nevirapine , given to HIV-positive pregnant women during labor to prevent the transmission of the virus to their babies, could have saved her daughter Nomazizi,
ISTANBUL, Turkey -- To wear a condom or not to wear a condom? That is the question Turkey s Health Ministry is posing to young people, enlisting Shakespeare, Chinese history and a chorus of singing condoms in an effort to spread awareness about the dangers of AIDS. With the help of UNICEF, the ministry has produced a h
LONDON (AP) - New research indicates that performing a blood test after six days of new medication, instead of the typical four weeks, could get HIV patients onto the best drug cocktail more quickly, sparing them unnecessary side effects and reducing the virus ability to become resistant to the pills. The approach, des
The AIDS drug cocktails that have saved the lives of countless adults have proved powerfully effective in children, too. A four-year study of 1,028 HIV-infected children and teen-agers found that combining protease inhibitors with standard AIDS drugs cut the risk of death by two-thirds, to less than 1 percent annually.
CAPE TOWN, South Africa -- A leading international human rights group on Wednesday accused South Africa s president of neglect in tackling the AIDS epidemic sweeping his country. The New York-based Human Rights Watch urged President Thabo Mbeki to take urgent action to slow the spread of AIDS. Mbeki has previously been
BEIJING (AP) - Fewer than 1,000 Chinese children have AIDS, a figure that could grow drastically unless the government exploits its brief opportunity to prevent an epidemic of the disease that is sickening young people across Asia, U.N. children s advocates said Wednesday. China accounts for half the region s 600 milli
Scientists in search of a smallpox cure hope they ll find one already on the shelf. Their strategy: Sift through the hundreds of potential virus medicines developed by drug companies to see if any work against smallpox. Chances are good, they say, because 21 drugs have already been identified this way that can kill the
WASHINGTON (AP) - When the AIDS virus invades a cell, it picks a place on the cell s membrane that is rich in cholesterol, according to a new study at the National Institutes of Health. Researchers at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, a part of NIH, found that HIV, the virus that causes AIDs, a
WASHINGTON -- Sexually explicit workshops that receive government AIDS-prevention grants will undergo federal scrutiny, following an audit that found some of the programs promote sexual activity and meet the legal standard for obscenity. The inspector general of the Health and Human Services Department, Janet Rehnquist
BEIJING (AP) - Participants in China s first AIDS conference called for education of sex workers, installation of condom-dispensing machines and more open discussion in schools, saying such measures will reduce infection rates in the world s most populous nation. The meeting, which ended Friday, brought together more t
WASHINGTON (AP) - Federal AIDS-prevention money is paying for workshops that encourage sexual activity and meet the legal definition of obscenity, government investigators said in a report obtained Thursday. One program that was studied, Great Sex Workshop, examined ways of reducing the spread of HIV but also explored
BOSTON (AP) - A state board ruled Wednesday that an HIV-positive man with end-stage liver disease should be covered by Medicaid for a potentially life-saving liver transplant. The Division of Medical Assistance Board of Appeals said the procedure was medically necessary and not experimental. Some scientists believe tha
BEIJING -- Fear of discrimination prevents farmer Zhang Jianqi from telling his new neighbors in Beijing that his 8-year-old daughter has AIDS. Despair at finding treatment drove the two from their home village in Henan province, 620 miles south of the capital. Now, renting a room in a polluted village on Beijing s nor
BEIJING (AP) - Members of the increasingly affluent middle class that is powering China s explosive growth can carry AIDS up the economic ladder from poorer environments where infections spread most rapidly, a United Nations official warned Tuesday as the nation s first AIDS conference began. The problem, common in cou
BEIJING (AP) - China opened its first conference on AIDS Tuesday, promising to dedicate more resources to fighting the disease and to spread information into the vast nation s every corner - from government officials in Beijing to residents of the tiniest villages. More than 2,700 participants from 20 nations - doctors
BEIJING (AP) - China is holding a national conference on AIDS this week, underscoring growing concern about the spread of the disease in the world s most populous nation. Health care officials are alarmed the 30 percent annual growth rate in HIV infections and want to slow it to 10 percent by 2005. AIDS experts estimat
MBABANE, Swaziland (AP) - Swaziland s king paid the traditional fine of one cow Sunday for violating his own ban prohibiting girls under age 18 from having sexual relations. About 300 young women marched to a royal residence outside of the capital, Mbabane, and laid down their symbolic chastity belts - a multicolored t
SHANGHAI, China - The 27-year-old man traces the beginning of his nightmare to a drunken night two years ago, when a colleague took him to one of Shanghai s dozens of illegal brothels disguised as beauty salons. Two months later, he learned he had the AIDS virus. Like many with AIDS in China, he has not told friends an
VATICAN CITY (AP) - The Vatican harshly criticized a U.N. manual for handling sexual issues in refugee camps, saying that it raised serious and numerous concerns for the Catholic church. The manual promotes without reserve the so-called morning-after pill for contraception, presents sterilization as simple birth contro
MIAMI -- (AP) -- An appeals court erased a court order Wednesday requiring a doctor to reveal the names and addresses of patients who received prescription drugs for HIV through his pharmacy. The 3rd District Court of Appeal decided state laws protecting patient privacy rights and HIV confidentiality do not allow for t
American smart bombs zero in on programmed targets in Afghanistan . Bioterrorism protection at home may demand drugs that do just the opposite - kill just about any germ target in sight. Some researchers are trying to fashion such universal drugs. They would combat a wide spectrum of germs, the immune system breakdown
SHANGHAI, China (AP) - The 27-year-old man traces the beginning of his nightmare to a drunken night two years ago, when a colleague took him to one of Shanghai s dozens of illegal brothels disguised as beauty salons. Two months later, he learned he had the AIDS virus. Like many with AIDS in China, he has not told frien
LOS ANGELES (AP) - Ten years later, he is playing ball against guys half his age. He is running a small empire of theaters, coffeehouses and restaurants. And his smile - the one that launched a thousand ads - remains as wide as ever. I feel wonderful, Magic Johnson said. Everything is great, wonderful. I celebrate life
NEW YORK (AP) - A California man was sentenced Monday to 171/2 years in prison on a federal child sex conviction after prosecutors argued he deserved a longer prison term because he knew he was HIV positive when he planned to meet a boy for unprotected sex. District Judge Richard Casey called John Weisser a predator wh
HYDERABAD, India (AP) - A 22-year-old man axed to death five members of his family and seriously wounded three others after he tested positive for HIV and lost his job as a result, police said Sunday. Srinivas Rao also tried to kill himself after attacking his relatives Saturday, police said in Atreyapuram, a village i
WASHINGTON (AP) - The State Department s top science adviser said Friday the war on terrorism must not deflect attention from the need to combat infectious diseases, some of which, he said, could engulf entire continents if left unchecked. The United States and the international community must not and will not let terr
By LANSING, Mich. (AP) - Magic Johnson told his hometown fans that he doesn t feel sick from the HIV virus that causes AIDS. First of all, I m not sick. I have to correct you there, Johnson told a reporter Thursday as he appeared at a supermarket to meet fans and sign autographs. I feel wonderful. It s a situation that
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - Teen-agers may have outgrown their fear of ghouls and goblins, but health officials believe their haunted house has something far scarier: gonorrhea and genital warts. Hoping to combat one of the nation s highest rates of sexually transmitted diseases, city health officials have staged the STD F
CLEVELAND — A jury has awarded a former McDonald s restaurant manager $5 million based on his claims the company discriminated against him because he has HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. The jury in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court deliberated less than three hours Friday after a nine-day trial before ruling in favor
WASHINGTON - A new anti-viral drug is being added to the arsenal of anti-AIDS medications. The Food and Drug Administration said Monday it has approved Viread for use in combination with other drugs in fighting HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. The drug blocks reproduction of the virus, the agency said. Its technical na
PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad - Faye Gonzalez volunteered to be injected with a new experimental vaccine against HIV because the virus exacted a personal toll, taking the life of a close friend last year. If by helping to develop a vaccine I could spare somebody else that pain, then I want to be part of that, the 35-year-ol
PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad (AP) - Faye Gonzalez said she volunteered to be injected with a new experimental vaccine against HIV after the virus took the life of a close friend last year. If by helping to develop a vaccine I could spare somebody else that pain, then I want to be part of that, Gonzalez, 35, said recently a
BEIJING (AP) - China recorded 5,616 new cases of AIDS infection in the first nine months of this year, more than in all of last year, a state newspaper said Saturday. That raised the known number of people in China with the HIV virus to 28,133, the China Youth Daily said. Last year, some 5,201 new cases were reported,
AMSTERDAM, Netherlands -- The Dutch Cabinet approved a bill today that would allow pharmacies to fill marijuana prescriptions and for the government to pay for them. Parliament was expected to vote in the next few months on the proposal to put medicinal marijuana on the national health care plan. If the bill is passed
CAPE TOWN, South Africa - Researchers released a report Tuesday estimating AIDS could kill as many as 7 million South Africans by 2010, and they said government officials disputing the findings simply did not understand them. The report, commissioned by the Medical Research Council, said AIDS would account for one-thir
VISTA HERMOSA, Colombia -- Confounding officials who are powerless to stop them, guerrillas from Colombia s largest rebel army are forcing all residents of this town inside a southern rebel haven to be tested for HIV. Three people who tested positive have reportedly been expelled from the zone.
VISTA HERMOSA, Colombia - Confounding officials who are powerless to stop them, Colombia s largest guerrilla army is forcing all residents of this town inside a southern rebel safe haven to be tested for AIDS. Three people who tested positive have reportedly been expelled from the zone.
BEIJING (AP) - In an unusual official look at China s AIDS epidemic, a state newspaper on Thursday said 118 people in one village contracted the virus while selling blood. At least 10 of those infected have developed full-blown AIDS and six have died, the Guangzhou Daily reported. The report added to mounting official
MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) - Government ministers from more than 30 nations in the Asia-Pacific region concluded a conference Wednesday by committing themselves to the fight against the AIDS epidemic. Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said the 33 ministers who attended the Asia Pacific Ministerial Meeting - h
SOWETO, South Africa (AP) - As the South African government debated over the past few weeks just how deadly its HIV crisis is, Francina Mteniso lay in a hospital bed dying of the disease. She was buried Tuesday in a funeral full of tears and prayers, but also full of defiance against what many mourners saw as the gover
MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) - Researchers are optimistic a vaccine for HIV/AIDS will be available within 10 years, though the cost could be beyond the reach of many countries and its efficacy will probably be limited, a U.S. health expert said Sunday. Dozens of vaccine prototypes are under development around the world, w
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline PLC has granted a generic drug manufacturer a license to produce and market three key AIDS medicines in South Africa, a Glaxo official told The Associated Press Sunday. Under the deal, to be officially announced Monday, the South African company Asp
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) - The adoration can be heard in Rachel Durkin-Drga s voice as she cradles her 6-month-old daughter, Madeleine. She s flirting with the ceiling fan, the first-time mother says, her daughter cooing happily in her arms. She s doing very well and just going gangbusters. Madeleine entered the world in qui
BASEL, Switzerland (AP) - With AIDS drug prices slashed for the poorest countries, the problem now is how to get the vital medicine delivered to people with the disease, the head of Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche said Friday. We need infrastructure, training ... political will and commitment, Roche chief executive F
MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) - Delegates at an AIDS conference warned governments in Asia and the Pacific on Friday that they can no longer ignore an epidemic that has infected 6.4 million people in the region and is spreading quickly. Activists also called on drug companies to put people before profit in the fight agains
SYDNEY, Australia (AP) After more than a decade of relatively low rates of infection, the HIV/AIDS epidemic has begun spreading rapidly through Asia and the Pacific region, according to a report released Thursday. The rise, in some of the world s most populated countries, is mostly in high risk groups, such as intraven
ATLANTA (AP) - Some Americans who rushed to donate blood for strangers hurt in the terrorist attacks will get a very personal shock - news that traces of disease have turned up in their contributions. Two weeks after the suicide hijackings, the first letters and phone calls are going out to donors whose blood was rejec
WASHINGTON (AP) - The government has approved the first gene-based test to tell quickly whether an HIV patient s virus is mutating to make a particular drug therapy fail, important to know so the person can switch AIDS medications. Visible Genetics Inc. s Trugene is one of the most complex genetic test systems to clear
MAE CHAN, Thailand - Six women with HIV sit in the makeshift sauna, absorbing the acrid steam laced with herbal medicines in the hope it will ease their chronic fatigue. In a village nearby, a crowd is watching a show in which puppets tell the story of a family devastated by the teenage daughter s misadventure with uns
MADISON, Wis. (AP) - Federal officials have sued a grocery store on behalf of a 16-year-old who says she was fired from her job bagging groceries because she has the AIDS virus. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sued on behalf of Korrin Krause, who complained she was fired in February after one day on the job
TRIPOLI, Libya (AP) - It began in the summer of 1998, when several infants died and no one immediately knew why. Three years later, six Bulgarians and a Palestinian - all doctors and nurses - face the death penalty if they are convicted of killing 393 children by injecting them with blood contaminated with the AIDS vir
COLUMBUS, Ga. (AP) A 40-year-old man in the final stages of AIDS has pleaded guilty to molesting a 15-year-old girl. Prosecutor George Lipscomb said the incident occurred Feb. 12 after the girl fled a bad home life and called Hector L. Ayala. He took her to his apartment and engaged in sexual contact with her. She w
ST. LOUIS - The St. Louis mayor ordered the removal of nine taxpayer-funded billboards aimed at raising AIDS awareness, including eight that show two bare-chested black men embracing with the caption, Brothers Loving Brothers Safely. Mayor Francis Slay said Tuesday the billboards were inappropriate. Slay s chief of sta
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) - Although pharmaceutical companies have cut the price of AIDS medication, South Africa still cannot afford to provide the drugs through the public health system, the health minister said Thursday. More than 4.7 million South Africans, 11 percent of the population, are HIV positive - one of
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) - Doctors Without Borders plans to export to developing countries Brazil s controversial anti-AIDS program and AIDS drugs, including locally made copies of patented medicines. The international aid organization said Thursday it signed a pact this week with Brazilian health minister Jose Serr
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - A biotechnology company founded by Jonas Salk ended its multimillion-dollar feud Tuesday with the University of California, San Francisco, over the school s conclusion that an AIDS vaccine it developed doesn t work. Immune Response Corp. funded the school s research on the drug and then tried to bl
WASHINGTON (AP) - The advertisements addressed to gay men were provocative: Learn to write racy stories about your sexual encounters, choose toys for solo and partner sex or share tales of erotic experiences. All of it was done at government expense, in the name of preventing AIDS. These expenditures - along with other
PHILADELPHIA -- Vaccines intended to protect people from getting AIDS may also work as a treatment for those already infected, boosting their immune system so they can temporarily stop taking AIDS drugs. So-called therapeutic vaccines, which harness the body s own immune system to control HIV, have long been a goal of
ABUJA, Nigeria -- Nigeria began what it called Africa s most ambitious AIDS treatment program Friday - although health officials admitted they had yet to receive any of the cheap generic drugs needed for the plan. The government s program had originally been scheduled to kick off Sept. 1. Officials, however, have not f
SCHOFIELD, Wis. -- A grocery store owner disputes a 16-year-old girl s claim that she was fired as a bagger because she has HIV. Bernard Enkro, owner of Quality Foods IGA, said Korrin Krause was offered another job as an office clerical worker after the store discovered she has the AIDS virus. Our interest was in prote
PHILADELPHIA -- For 600 days and counting, monkeys given an experimental new AIDS vaccine have survived with no signs of illness despite exposure to lethal doses of virus, raising hopes that scientists may be headed at last toward an effective vaccine for people. Several studies presented at an AIDS vaccine conference
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico -- In a reversal of roles, a U.S. pharmaceutical giant said Tuesday the Caribbean wasn t doing enough to provide discounted HIV-fighting drugs to patients. For years, developing nations complained that prices for HIV drugs put them out of their reach. Then in March, New Jersey-based
Infection with an apparently harmless, recently discovered virus seems to interfere with HIV, slowing its progression and prolonging survival of people infected with the AIDS virus. What isn t known is exactly how the virus, called GBV-C or hepatitis G, inhibits HIV. Researchers say that if they can figure that out, it
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico -- (AP) -- In a reversal of roles, a U.S. pharmaceutical giant said Tuesday the Caribbean wasn t doing enough to provide discounted HIV-fighting drugs to patients. For years, developing nations complained that prices for HIV drugs put them out of their reach. Then in March, New Jersey-based Merck
DURBAN, South Africa (AP) - The stigma surrounding the AIDS pandemic has helped fuel the spread of the disease around the world, the United Nations AIDS chief told the world conference against racism. The discrimination is rooted in a combination of shame about the sexual way the virus is often transmitted and fear of
DURBAN, South Africa (AP) - Countries gathered at the world racism conference need to adopt legislation to outlaw discrimination against those infected with HIV , the United Nations top AIDS fighter said Wednesday. The laws should send a clear message of support to people who are infected, a message that should encoura
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) - Delegates attending the annual convention of a prominent black denomination were greeted Tuesday with dispiriting statistics concerning health care. The National Baptist Convention USA heard that the average life expectancy for blacks in the United States is 64.4 years, compared with 73 for whites; t
SCHOFIELD, Wis. -- A 16-year-old girl who was born with the HIV virus has filed a discrimination complaint against her first employer alleging she was fired because of her illness. Korrin Krause worked only one day as a grocery bagger at Quality Foods IGA before the manager called her mother to verify she had HIV and s
WASHINGTON - The share of HIV infections that are drug-resistant will jump to 42 percent in San Francisco by 2005, according to a team of researchers. Estimating the current rate of drug resistance at 28.5 percent, the group used a mathematical formula to calculate its likely increase over the next few years. HIV, the
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) Brazil withdrew its threat to ignore patents and start making a generic version of a powerful AIDS drug Friday after a Swiss pharmaceutical giant promised to slash prices by 40 percent. Health Minister Jose Serra, who last week said Brazil would start producing a generic version of the drug
WASHINGTON -- The share of HIV infections that are drug-resistant will jump to 42 percent in San Francisco by 2005, according to a team of researchers. Estimating the current rate of drug resistance at 28.5 percent, the group used a mathematical formula to calculate its likely increase over the next few years. HIV, hum
BRAZZAVILLE, Republic of Congo -- Clinics in Republic of Congo s capital will provide free HIV treatment to pregnant women starting Monday, part of an effort to block mother-to-child transmission in one of the African countries hardest-hit by AIDS. The West African nation of Ghana , meanwhile, said it is in negotiatio
BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) AIDS is the leading cause of death in Thailand not heart attacks or accidents as previously thought, health officials said Friday. AIDS and related complications accounted for 16 percent of all deaths in 1998, said Dr. Chanpen Chuprapawan of the Health Ministry, after examining 20,000 deaths in s
WASHINGTON (AP) - The share of HIV (news - web sites) infections that are drug-resistant will jump to 42 percent in San Francisco by 2005, according to a team of researchers. Estimating the current rate of drug resistance at 28.5 percent, the group used a mathematical formula to calculate its likely increase over the n
BEIJING (AP) - China s AIDS epidemic, until now largely confined to drug users and others at high risk, could spread rapidly in the general population without swift and effective measures, a U.S. health official said Thursday. Current pilot HIV-prevention programs are too small and few Chinese know how to avoid catchin
SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic (AP) -- U.S. drug company Merck & Co. said Tuesday it is making HIV-fighting drugs available to eight poor Caribbean countries at cut-rate prices. Two anti-HIV medications -- Crixivan and Stocrin
LONDON (AP) - Princess Diana s memorial fund launched a $7.2 million initiative Tuesday to help Africans suffering from terminal illnesses. The Diana, Princess of Wales Memorial Fund said the money will be used to ease the suffering of those in the final stages of HIV , AIDS and cancer. For millions of people in this r
CAPE TOWN, South Africa -- In a steady voice, 16-year-old Jabu tells how her father raped her repeatedly, infecting her with the HIV virus. Once too scared to speak out, she encouraged others Friday to fight anti-AIDS discrimination in South Africa at the first national meeting of children who are either infected or wh
ATLANTA (AP) The scientists trying to create a vaccine to prevent AIDS suddenly seem optimistic, even bullish, words that have not been heard much in this perennially gloomy field. For the first time, many researchers appear confident a vaccine is possible. More than anything else, the monkeys are responsible for the c
NAIROBI, Kenya -- Three partners developing and testing the first HIV/AIDS vaccine specifically designed for an African strain of the disease have agreed to joint ownership of the drug s patents. The three-year agreement signed Friday settles one of the hurdles that had earlier threatened to delay testing the vaccine t
SHANGHAI, China (AP) The threatening phone calls and summons by angry officials are over. Government leaders who once shunned her now smile and say hello in public. The reversal represents a victory of sorts for Gao Yaojie, a retired gynecologist who publicized the spread of AIDS through illegal blood buying in rural v
WASHINGTON (AP) - The State Department is ending HIV screening of foreign personnel and locally hired Americans at U.S. diplomatic posts. In an announcement Thursday, the department said, With this new policy, the U.S. sets an example consistent with its message of nondiscrimination to host countries. The new policy ap
BEIJING -- China registered a sharp increase in reported cases of HIV infections this year, and infection rates among drug users and prostitutes are climbing, the Ministry of Health reported Thursday. In the first six months of 2001, 3,541 new infections were reported, a 67 percent increase compared to the 2,115 cases
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- AIDS activists and pediatricians filed a lawsuit Tuesday against the South African government, demanding it provide medicine to HIV-infected, pregnant women to help prevent transmission of the disease to their babies. The Treatment Action Campaign, a coalition of AIDS activists, has been n
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- AIDS activists, doctors sue South African government to force drug distribution to babies With hundreds of South African babies born with HIV every day, AIDS activists and doctors sued the government Tuesday demanding it distribute a key AIDS drug that could slash that number in half.
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - AIDS activists and a group of pediatricians sued the government on Tuesday, demanding it provide medicine to HIV -infected pregnant women to help stop the disease from passing to their babies. The Treatment Action Campaign, a coalition of AIDS activists, has been negotiating with South
MAE CHAN, Thailand -- Six women with HIV sit in the makeshift sauna, absorbing the acrid steam laced with herbal medicines in the hope it will ease their chronic fatigue. In a village nearby, a crowd is watching a show in which puppets tell the story of a family devastated by the teenage daughter s misadventure with un
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - South African AIDS activists said Monday they plan to sue the government to force it to give medicine to HIV-infected pregnant women to help prevent transmission of the disease to their babies. The Treatment Action Campaign, which has been pushing the government to give the AIDS drug
CAPSHAW, Ala. -- A prison within a prison, the Special Unit lives up to its name. Every man in the Alabama prison system known to have AIDS is confined here, a converted warehouse at the Limestone Correctional Facility. More than 200 prisoners -- some frail and red-eyed, others fortified by bodybuilding -- inhabit long
ATLANTA -- The declines in the number of Americans contracting AIDS and those dying of the disease are leveling off, signaling a disturbing turning point in the 20-year epidemic, federal health officials said Monday. AIDS cases and deaths peaked in the early 1990s, then fell steadily as new, more effective drugs took h
ATLANTA -- More than 40 percent of HIV-positive Americans don t know they are infected until just before developing full-blown AIDS, sometimes missing out on a decade or more of treatment, suggests a government study released Tuesday. The study of about 19,000 AIDS patients found about two in five first tested positive
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) - Officials have launched a program to increase awareness of HIV and AIDS among blacks in a state where they make up about one-quarter of the population but accounted for more than two-thirds of new cases of the virus last year. The program, being developed by Alabama State University, includes br
ATLANTA (AP) - The declines in the number of Americans contracting AIDS and those dying of the disease are leveling off, signaling a disturbing turning point in the 20-year epidemic, federal health officials said Monday. AIDS cases and deaths peaked in the early 1990s, then fell steadily as new, more effective drugs to
HANOI, Vietnam -- Asia s sex industry is growing rapidly and diversifying, making efforts to control AIDS more difficult, the World Health Organization said Monday. It said Asia has managed to greatly reduce the severity of its AIDS epidemic with programs encouraging condom use. For example, in
DAKAR, Senegal -- With a twinkle in her eye, a mother of 10 slips a condom over a Coke bottle before a room of attentive Muslim women in veils and long dresses. This is how I protect my partner, Aminata Niang explains, then cracks a few risque jokes before launching into a frank discussion about how to use and dispose
BANGOR, Maine -- Valerie Emerson had been ready to disappear for days by the time the judge reached his decision. The car had a full tank of gas. The trunk was crammed with clothes. A road map was marked with safe houses throughout the country where she and her three boys could seek refuge. She had already said goodbye
WASHINGTON -- Secretary of State Colin Powell will visit the Bahamas on Aug. 13 for talks on bilateral cooperation in the areas of counter-narcotics, illegal migration, financial reform, HIV/AIDS prevention and regional issues.
WASHINGTON -- Adults who want to have children should pay closer attention to their habits, weight and advancing age, says a new ad campaign. Using the Internet and public service announcements displayed on city buses, the American Society for Reproductive Medicine asks men and women in their 20s and early 30s to curb
ABUJA, Nigeria -- Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo urged his country s military brass to distribute free condoms to the armed forces to help fight the spread of AIDS, a newspaper reported Sunday. We must not allow HIV-AIDS to ravage our armed forces, the independent Guardian newspaper quoted Obasanjo as telling mil
BOSTON (AP) - When Belynda Dunn s HMO rejected her request for a liver transplant because of her HIV infection, she felt like she had been slapped across the face. I think it just goes along with the idea that if you have HIV, you ve got the black plague, said Dunn, a 49-year-old AIDS activist who s worked to stop the
PRETORIA, South Africa -- Roman Catholic bishops in southern Africa denounced condoms on Monday as an immoral and misguided weapon in the fight against HIV infection but said married couples with the AIDS virus could use them in limited circumstances. The Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference said condoms may
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - Nigeria plans to launch the largest AIDS treatment program in Africa using cheap generic drugs on Sept. 1, a U.N. special envoy said. The 10,000 adults and 5,000 children who will receive a drug cocktail are just a tiny fraction of the more than 2.6 million Nigerians infected with the HIV virus t
WASHINGTON (AP) - A government panel is recommending that the Food and Drug Administration let certain teen-agers participate in medical experiments without their parents consent. The FDA regulates all testing of drugs and medical devices. FDA attorneys say federal law governing the agency mandates that only adults can
TORONTO (AP) - Canadians suffering from terminal illnesses and chronic conditions such as arthritis can legally grow and smoke marijuana, or designate someone else to grow it for them, under regulations that take effect Monday. The new rules are part of the first system in the world that includes a government-approved
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration should not dodge debate over whether the United States owes compensation to blacks because of slavery, the president of the National Urban League says. Arguments for reparations are morally and legally compelling; we should press our case on the conscience of this country and t
ATLANTA -- The teen birth rate fell to a record low in the United States last year, continuing a steady drop that began in the 1990s, the government said Tuesday. For every 1,000 females ages 15 to 19, there were 48.7 births last year - the lowest rate in the six decades the statistic has been kept, the National Center
LOS ANGELES -- Advocates for an AIDS-stricken Thai boy who was used as a prop by immigration smugglers have won their battle to keep the boy in America. Four-year-old Phanupong Got Khaisri will become the first applicant for a new kind of visa for victims of trafficking and violence, U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft
NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. -- Drug maker Bristol-Myers Squibb on Monday announced a nearly $250 million project to expand research and development operations at its 96-acre campus here. The project will increase Bristol-Myers capacity to develop and produce new medicines, including drugs to treat cancer, HIV and hepatitis B,
GENOA, Italy -- President Bush and other world leaders closed out a protest-marred summit Sunday, conceding that they were unable to resolve sharp differences between the United States and the rest of the nations over global warming, according to a draft of their final communique. The draft communique said all the
WASHINGTON (AP) - A task force created by President Bush and a panel from the Clinton era will work together on the new administration s AIDS agenda. Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson said he recommended that the Presidential Advisory Council on HIV and AIDS continue, even though federal rules governin
The statement on Africa issued Saturday at the summit of major industrialized nations: Meeting at the Genova G8 summit, we agreed to support African efforts to resolve African problems. Peace, stability and the eradication of poverty in Africa are among the most important challenges we face in the new millennium. We we
WASHINGTON -- Condoms can reduce the spread of HIV and gonorrhea, but there is not enough evidence to say for certain they protect against other sexually transmitted diseases, federal health officials said Friday. To definitely answer the remaining questions about condom effectiveness for preventing STD (sexually trans
ATLANTA (AP) - A program in Thailand to test and treat women for the AIDS virus reduced the risk of mother-to-child transmission by two-thirds, offering a model for other developing nations, the U.S. government said Thursday. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the program reduced the transmission risk
NEW YORK (AP) - Public health experts are asking the world s industrial powers to give more to a new international AIDS fund, saying the nearly $1 billion raised so far is not nearly enough to fight the global epidemic. Donor countries are fooling themselves if they feel that this would make a significant impact; it wi
STUTTGART, Germany (AP) - A German court sentenced an American disc jockey to 10 years in prison for rape and infecting at least four women with the AIDS virus. Stuttgart Judge Stefan Eckert ruled Wednesday that Stoney Berly Gibbs, 36, had acted irresponsibly by sleeping with several women without using a condom, altho
MOSCOW (AP) - The head of the World Bank urged the government Friday to use its rebounding economy to combat the spread of AIDS and tuberculosis. The World Bank has offered Russia a $150 million loan to fund treatment and prevention programs, but details are still being worked out with the Russian Health Ministry.
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - With millions of Africans dying from AIDS and millions more infected every year, a group of Roman Catholic clergy in southern Africa is debating whether the church should relax its blanket ban on condom use. A proposal by the AIDS office of the Southern African Catholic Bishops Confer
CHICAGO (AP) - Two new studies suggest that the slight blips in virus levels that many AIDS patients experience while taking drug cocktails do not necessarily mean the treatment is failing after all. The findings could have significant implications for AIDS treatment. Doctors generally try to suppress the AIDS virus to
WASHINGTON (AP) - Republicans beat back two Democratic attempts to slash funds from the war on drugs in South America before the House Appropriations Committee voted Tuesday night to approve spending $15.2 billion in foreign aid next year. The bill, which matches President Bush s overall request for foreign aid, is up
WASHINGTON (AP) - AIDS -related deaths in the nation s prisons have fallen sharply because of better treatment, but increasing numbers of inmates have tested positive for the virus that causes the disease, a Justice Department study says. In 1999, 242 state prisoners died from AIDS-related causes, down from a 1995 peak
LUSAKA, Zambia (AP) - Kenneth Kaunda was nothing if not a man of power. He led Zambia to independence from Britain, became his country s unchallenged ruler and spearheaded the international fight against apartheid. But that power was meaningless on Dec. 23, 1986, when Kaunda and his wife stood in State House and watche
TORONTO (AP) - New regulations expanding the legal use of medical marijuana will allow people with terminal or debilitating illnesses to possess and cultivate pot, or designate someone to do it for them. But the Canadian Medical Association opposed the rules announced Wednesday, saying that too little is known about th
LAGOS, Nigeria -- At the emergency section of a sprawling church on the outskirts of Lagos, more than two dozen people sit on wooden pews, holding placards proclaiming they re infected with HIV. The scene is rare in a country where talking about the virus is all but taboo, and open admission of infection can provoke de
MAGU, Tanzania (AP) - Taabu John got the message that is making the rounds of the bars in this Lake Victoria fishing town: Promiscuous sex can lead to AIDS, and a change in behavior can save your life. The 37-year-old single mother of two - a former bartender and prostitute - changed her life because of the Tanzania-
UNITED NATIONS -- Buoyed by the success of a historic three-day U.N. summit, politicians, health experts and AIDS activists now face the challenge of putting to action their battle plan to halt the killer disease s relentless march across the globe. The 189-member General Assembly adopted the Declaration of Commitment
WASHINGTON -- Taking on a sensitive issue, Surgeon General David Satcher urges Americans to respect diversity in sexual values and calls on parents, schools and community leaders to engage in honest, mature discussion about sexual issues. The wide-ranging report released Thursday says communities must provide lifelong
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- Africa s AIDS fighters have heard it before: the promises of action, the unenforceable commitments, the self congratulations of Western officials proud even to be discussing the pandemic ravaging the world s poorest countries. So the conclusion of a historic U.N. summit on AIDS with the ad
UNITED NATIONS -- Buoyed by the success of a historic three-day U.N. summit, politicians, health experts and AIDS activists now face the challenge of putting into action their battle plan to halt the killer disease s relentless march across the globe. The 189-member General Assembly adopted the Declaration of Commitmen
WASHINGTON -- Surgeon General David Satcher called on parents, schools and community leaders Thursday to get past their nervousness about sex so they can do a better job preventing unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases. In a far-reaching report, Satcher called for a mature and thoughtful discussion abo
NEW YORK -- Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, which already have the world s fastest-rising rates of new HIV/AIDS infections, are headed for a large-scale epidemic unless anti-AIDS programs go into full swing now, specialists on the region have warned. The numbers are still small compared with Africa, where 2
NEW YORK -- Brazil continues to prepare to become the first country to issue a compulsory license for an AIDS drug in case Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche Group doesn t slash the price of one of its medicines by 45%. Brazil and Roche have been negotiating the price since the beginning of the year, and Brazil is expect
WASHINGTON (AP) - South African President Thabo Mbeki again refused to link HIV with AIDS , even though he agreed that s what the scientists say. I don t think my personal belief is relevant to a scientific fact, he said Wednesday after being asked whether he thinks the HIV virus is the primary cause of AIDS. Mbeki
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - In the first universal approach to battling a disease, the United Nations has laid out an AIDS blueprint setting tough targets for reducing infection rates and protecting the rights of people with HIV/AIDS. Western nations were forced to back away from specifically naming the most vulnerable popul
ORANGE FARM, South Africa (AP) - The purple billboards along South Africa s dusty roads confront the stark fear of a generation experiencing the sexual confusion of puberty amid the AIDS pandemic. I had sex. Will I die? - Siphiwe, 14. The advertising campaign is part of the loveLife empire - television programs, radio
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - David Brooks Arnold, a 65-year-old grandfather from Washington, D.C., and Josephine Chiturumani, a 42-year old mother of four from Zimbabwe , have more in common than they expected. They both work for the Red Cross, both lost partners to AIDS and both are HIV -positive. People from all walks o
VATICAN CITY (AP) - Pope John Paul II has urged those involved in the fight against AIDS to help young people develop what he called responsible maturity in their love lives. Vatican Radio on Wednesday said that was a highlight of a message the pontiff had sent to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan for this week s AIDS
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - In the first global approach to battling a disease, the United Nations adopted an AIDS blueprint Wednesday setting tough targets for reducing infection rates and protecting the rights of people with the virus. Under pressure from Islamic countries, Western nations were forced to back away from spe
WASHINGTON (AP) - A House panel endorsed spending $15.2 billion in foreign aid next year, amid disputes over the size of funds to wage drug wars in South America, congressional meddling in foreign policy and President Bush s ban on aid to foreign pro-abortion groups. The $15.2 billion for fiscal 2002, which begins Oct.
PORTLAND, Maine (AP) - Frances W. Peabody, a community leader who became Maine s best-known AIDS activist after losing her grandson to the disease, has died after a short illness. She was 98. Peabody was hospitalized over the weekend and died peacefully on Tuesday with her family by her side, friends said. Known as Fr
At the national level: -By 2003, ensure the development and implementation of multisector national strategies and financing plans for combating HIV/AIDS that address the epidemic in forthright terms; confront stigma, silence and denial; address gender and age-based dimensions of the epidemic; eliminate discrimination a
NEW YORK (AP) - Pfizer Inc. s top executive will be a member of the U.S. delegation to next week s U.N. General Assembly special session on HIV/AIDS, a move that has raised hackles among activists. Hank McKinnell, Pfizer s chairman, president and chief executive, will be part of a group of about 50 conference delegates
NEW YORK (AP)--Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, which already have the world s fastest rising rates of new HIV/AIDS infections, are headed for a large-scale epidemic unless anti-AIDS programs go into full swing now, specialists on the region have warned. The numbers are still small compared with Africa, wher
UNITED NATIONS -- More than 600,000 people in China are estimated to have the AIDS virus and the number is increasing by 30 percent annually, primarily because of an upsurge in infections among intravenous drug users, China s health minister says. While the prevalence of the HIV virus and AIDS is still low - just 0.5 p
UNITED NATIONS -- A year-old agreement between pharmaceutical companies and the United Nations has delivered lifesaving AIDS drugs to thousands of Africans, but extending treatment to the millions more who still need it will require much more help from abroad, delegates at a U.N. conference said. The greatest obstacle
UNITED NATIONS -- Women in nations hardest hit by AIDS often are afraid of refusing unprotected sex, a factor in the spread of the killer disease, experts at a U.N. AIDS conference said. Nearly half of the world s 36 million people infected with HIV are women - and the number is growing. Women now make up 60 percent of
UNITED NATIONS -- One after another, African leaders at the United Nations first global gathering on HIV/AIDS made emotional pleas for help Monday in ending the devastation wrought by the epidemic. Nigeria s president warned that entire populations face extinction. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, seeking $7-10 billion fo
NEW YORK -- Shunned by a repressive military junta and shut out by their own fearful communities, AIDS-stricken people in Myanmar are dying in numbers that researchers say may be more than 50 times higher than official figures. In a country where information is so tightly controlled that an unlicensed fax machine can l
NEW YORK -- The war chest to fight AIDS will fall dramatically short of the $7 to $10 billion target set by U.N. Secretary-general Kofi Annan, but the goal was overly ambitious, Pfizer s chairman, president and CEO said. Henry McKinnell, who is a U.S. delegate to the U.N. Special Session on AIDS, said Monday that even
ABUJA, Nigeria -- As world leaders talked about AIDS Monday at a U.N. summit in New York, Africans went on Monday with the ordeal of living - and dying - with it. As ever, short on treatment, and short on hope. AIDS will kill most of us in the next 10 or 15 years, said Dr. Ben Anyene, health commissioner in southeaster
MOGADISHU, Somalia -- Dozens of youths, protected by their own rifle-toting guards, braved conservative Somali society and armed militiamen on Monday to do something Somalis have never done before: attempt to raise public awareness about HIV/AIDS. Riding in 10 trucks draped with banners in Somali saying Save Your Life
GENEVA -- The United States has withdrawn a complaint with the World Trade Organization over a law used by Brazil to ensure cheap drugs to fight AIDS, a Brazilian trade negotiator said Monday. Jose Alfredo Graca Lima told reporters the two countries had come to an understanding over a law that requires owners of Braz
UNITED NATIONS -- The United States will provide more money to a global fund to fight AIDS and will continue to lead the world in financing AIDS research, Secretary of State Colin Powell on Monday told a U.N. conference drafting a blueprint to combat the killer disease. Decrying that it had taken 20 years to gather the
UNITED NATIONS -- The United Nations opens a three-day session on AIDS with a powerful symbol - a multicolored, patchwork quilt honoring the millions of lives lost to one of the worst epidemics in human history. The conference s 3,000 participants - health experts, politicians, scientists, AIDS activists and patients -
NAIROBI, Kenya -- A human rights group on Monday accused the Kenyan government of neglecting millions of children, many of them orphans, whose families have fallen victim to HIV/AIDS. The New York-based Human Rights Watch said the government was failing to take responsibility for children who are being forced out of sc
NEW YORK -- Thirteen months ago, the United Nations initiated a program to expand access to AIDS drugs in the world s developing countries. While the program has picked up steam, it has achieved negligible results. This week as thousands gather for the U.N. General Assembly Special Session aimed at mobilizing efforts t
NEW YORK -- Hundreds of AIDS activists demonstrated in pouring rain Saturday in a call for increased support for people with AIDS worldwide. Their march and rally were held to coincide with the United Nations General Assembly s first special session on the health crisis that has claimed more than 22 million victims and
UNITED NATIONS -- Twenty years after the discovery of AIDS, the U.N. General Assembly is holding its first special session on a health crisis that has claimed over 22 million victims and left 36 million others facing a death sentence. Everyone has come to this late, said Stephen Lewis, the U.N. special envoy on HIV/AID
NEW YORK -- One of the world s largest pharmaceutical manufacturers lost a defamation lawsuit for misusing a woman s photo in a brochure for an AIDS drug, prosecutors say. The woman sued Merck & Company and its New York advertising agency, Harrison & Star, for improperly using her photograph in a brochure for
UMLAZI, South Africa (AP) - The visits from nurse Prim Zungu can t remedy the disaster AIDS has heaped on the Dlamini family. The comfort, advice and occasional pills she gives 23-year-old Numbolelo do little to stop the ache of poverty worsened by the illness. South Africa s AIDS policy calls for more home-based healt
NEW YORK (AP) - ABC Daytime is auctioning original gowns, costumes, and T-shirts from the eighth annual Nurses Ball on General Hospital and Port Charles to benefit the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation. The Nurses Ball is a gala event, woven into the storylines of the two soap operas, and is designed to raise
GENEVA (AP) - The U.N. labor agency Friday adopted a code to stop workplace discrimination against people infected with the AIDS virus, urging special attention to the vulnerability of women to the disease. The 32-page code of practice, approved unanimously by the governing body of the International Labor Organization,
GENEVA (AP) - The World Trade Organization will examine whether its rules protecting drug patents can become more flexible to address concerns by developing countries and health activists that the regulations prevent vital medicines reaching the poor. As a followup to a one-day conference on access to drugs, the WTO s
TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) - The AIDS pandemic is devastating Africa, and that s where most global aid and the cheaper drugs are going. Largely left out are people in Latin America like Addis Vitalia, a 29-year-old mother of two who is dying of AIDS and who cannot afford medicines that could control her disease.
WASHINGTON (AP)- A gene mutation that arose thousands of years ago now protects hundreds of millions of people from severe malaria, the mosquito-borne disease that is the world s deadliest infection. Researchers report Friday in the journal Science that they have traced the natural evolution in Africa, Asia and the Med
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - Moves by corporations outside the pharmaceutical industry to get involved in the AIDS fight have been welcomed at the United Nations. But some activists wonder if the initiatives constitute good will - or just good public relations. This week, Coca-Cola and DaimlerChrysler announced AIDS-related p
NEW YORK (AP) - The world s poorest countries will soon need $9.2 billion a year to deal with AIDS, a study concludes - $4.4 billion to treat people with the illness and $4.8 billion to prevent new infections. Half the money will be needed in sub-Saharan Africa, according to the report in Friday s issue of the journal
NEW YORK (AP) - Pfizer Inc. s (NYSE:PFE - news) top executive will be a member of the U.S. delegation to next week s U.N. General Assembly special session on HIV/AIDS , a move likely raise hackles among activists. Hank McKinnell, Pfizer s chairman, president and chief executive, will be part of a group of about 50 conf
UNITED NATIONS -- The U.N. campaign to fight the AIDS epidemic will bring more than 3,000 government officials, activists and business leaders to the United Nations next week to back a global agenda to tackle the killer disease and spur support for a new fund to pay for it. Six months ago, the United Nations was worrie
GENEVA -- World trade rules protecting drug patents should be made more flexible because they hurt efforts to fight the AIDS epidemic, developing country negotiators at the World Trade Organization said Wednesday. The rules should not be allowed to undermine the legitimate right of WTO members to formulate their own pu
GENEVA -- The U.N. agency combatting AIDS announced Wednesday that the Coca-Cola Co. has joined the battle against the disease in Africa, deploying its vast distribution system to help. No dollar value was placed on the offer. The Coca-Cola Africa Foundation will provide help from its marketing and distribution system
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - The first high-level U.N. meeting to tackle the global AIDS epidemic will bring representatives of 180 countries to New York next week, including 24 leaders - the vast majority from Africa, which has been hardest-hit by the killer disease. It s indicative of the priority that African nations are a
GENEVA (AP) - The Coca-Cola Co. is joining DaimlerChrysler and other multinational corporations in the fight against HIV/AIDS in Africa, offering to use Coke trucks to deliver everything from condoms to AIDS prevention fliers in its effort to combat the deadly disease. The Coca-Cola Africa Foundation, working with the
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast -- Recent deals with major pharmaceutical companies for cheaper AIDS drugs stand to increase the number of patients able to get treatment in Africa, home to 26.5 million of the 37 million people in the world living with HIV. But even at reduced prices, doctors and researchers in Ivory Coast say few
BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) - The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation on Tuesday donated $100 million to an international health fund to fight AIDS and called on European Union nations and other countries to make further contributions. A dramatic increase in funding is necessary and required to fight the pandemic, said found
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) - Auto giant DaimlerChrysler said Tuesday it will provide free anti-AIDS drugs to help its South African employees and their families combat the disease. Absenteeism and sick days are always an issue, company spokeswoman Annelise van der Laan said from Pretoria, South Africa. Based on the in
GENEVA (AP) - The pharmaceutical industry and health activists clashed over drug patent rules Tuesday ahead of a meeting at the World Trade Organization to discuss global regulations. WTO rules treat patented drugs like CDs or Barbie dolls, said Ellen t Hoen, a spokeswoman for the drug access initiative of aid agency M
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP) - Every month, Edmond Adjobi scrimps, borrows and begs for the $14 he needs for the cut-rate HIV drugs that keep him healthy. But sometimes he just can t afford them. When I don t have the means to take my medicine, I am very afraid that one day something awful will happen to me, says Adjobi,
SOWETO, South Africa (AP) - Hundreds of singing and dancing young South Africans joined President Thabo Mbeki on Saturday as he retraced the steps of a protest march thousands of Soweto schoolchildren staged 25 years ago. The march, known as the Soweto uprising, became a turning point in South Africa s history. It brou
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - Unaccustomed to talking frankly about homosexuality and prostitution, diplomats from over 100 countries have found themselves immersed in roiling negotiations over what to do about the AIDS pandemic. Many Muslim countries that view homosexuality as a sin punishable by death do not want men who hav
Following is a look at the disputed language in a draft declaration to be adopted at the June 25-27 U.N. Special Session on AIDS . The text was obtained by The Associated Press. REDUCING VULNERABILITY The draft document states: - By 2003, develop and or strengthen national strategies, policies and programs, supported b
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Federal Trade Commission has settled fraud charges against five companies that used the Internet to sell miracle cures for everything from AIDS to cancer. The companies must stop their false advertising and, in some cases, repay their customers and pay fines to the government, the FTC said Thursda
NEW YORK (AP) - Africa needs billions of dollars in aid to help a generation of forward-thinking leaders pull their countries from a downward spiral of poverty and disease, the World Bank president said Thursday. James Wolfensohn told the Council of Foreign Relations that a group of leaders in sub-Saharan Africa don t
WASHINGTON (AP) - Five companies that offered products on the Internet claiming to cure everything from AIDS to cancer have agreed to settle federal fraud charges, the Federal Trade Commission said Thursday. The agency filed charges against a sixth company in federal court June 4. The other five must stop their false a
WARSAW, Poland (AP) - Eastern Europe and former Soviet republics are being overwhelmed by a surge in AIDS cases, an organizer of a regional conference on fighting the disease said Wednesday. The countries of Eastern Europe and Central Asia are helpless toward AIDS. Some governments pretend the problem does not exist; o
GLASGOW, Scotland (AP) - British protesters shouting AIDS is the new apartheid heckled visiting South African President Thabo Mbeki, who has rejected calls for his government to provide AIDS drugs to patients. A few activists waved banners reading The Right to Life: The Right to Treatment and Wake up - HIV Equals AIDS
KHAYELITSHA, South Africa (AP) - Grace was coughing up blood. Her feet were numb. Her head pounded. Her mouth was full of sores. Her throat burned with a choking infection. Ulcers riddled her stomach. She was thin and bedridden and certain she was about to die. That was two weeks ago - before the AIDS medicine. Now
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Health and Human Services Department will review the $10.2 billion it spends on AIDS programs, Secretary Tommy Thompson said Tuesday. A panel led by deputy secretary Claude Allen will survey the programs to find out what s working and how we can best use the dollars to do the job better, Thompson
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) - Kenya s parliament unanimously passed a law Tuesday that would allow the government to suspend patent rights in times of emergency, clearing the way for cheaper, generic AIDS drugs in the East African nation. Opposition lawmakers joined with Cabinet ministers in supporting the Industrial Propertie
OTTAWA (AP) - Canada will begin testing all immigrants and people seeking refugee status for the AIDS virus, Immigration Minister Elinor Caplan said Tuesday. A positive result would not mean automatic exclusion from Canada, Caplan said. Each case would be assessed individually, she said, with one factor in the decision
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) - Pharmaceutical companies must change their way of doing business to ensure that poor countries have access to essential AIDS drugs, the president of the world s largest drug company told The Associated Press. Henry McKinnell, chief executive of Pfizer Corp. and
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) - Experts on AIDS from North America and Uganda launched a training center for African doctors Monday, seeking to bolster delivery of new treatments for patients on the continent hit hardest by the disease. Financed by Pfizer Corp., the Academic Alliance for AIDS Care and Prevention in Afri
LONDON (AP) - Pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline expanded its offer of reduced prices for HIV /AIDS and anti-malarial drugs Monday to 63 developing countries, including all of sub-Saharan Africa. The preferential pricing policy, previously given on a case-by-case basis, was widened to include additional AIDS-fighting
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Mourners on Saturday packed the funeral of Nkosi Johnson, a 12-year-old AIDS activist who died last week, singing and dancing in tribute to the boy and his campaign to win acceptance for those with the disease. Seven television cameras vied for footage of the small white-and-gold coffi
WINTERTHUR, Switzerland (AP) - Winterthur Insurance became the first corporate donor to a new U.N. fund to fight AIDS when it announced a $1 million donation Friday. Peter Piot, executive director of the Joint U.N. Program on HIV /AIDS, welcomed the Swiss insurer s gift. We commend Winterthur for being the first pr
ATLANTA (AP) - Black leaders urged the Bush administration Friday to step up efforts to slow the alarming spread of AIDS among minorities, calling soaring infection rates a national emergency. The National Black Leadership Commission on AIDS concluded a two-day conference by announcing a comprehensive proposal that inc
WASHINGTON (AP) - The United States is committed to combating the AIDS epidemic in Africa but other countries also must contribute resources, the government s top foreign aid official told lawmakers Thursday. We re funding more money than the entire world, said Andrew Natsios, administrator of the U.S. Agency for Inter
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - With millions of people worldwide living with AIDS and the HIV virus, a new U.N. chart paints a grim picture of the epidemic spreading not only through Africa, but also through parts of Asia and Latin America. Five countries have at least 2 million people each living with AIDS or the HIV virus -
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) - The fight for cheaper AIDS drugs moved to Kenya s parliament Thursday with the introduction of a bill that would allow the suspension of patents in order to gain access to generic drugs. Key members of parliament received a petition Thursday signed by 50,000 Kenyans for the unfettered passage of t
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Hundreds of mourners, many weeping uncontrollably, paid tribute Wednesday to Nkosi Johnson, who championed the rights of child AIDS victims before succumbing to the disease at age 12. AIDS activists, entertainers and dozens of children filled Central Methodist Church for a memorial ser
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - The U.S. pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc. announced Wednesday it will expand its free distribution of a drug for AIDS patients in 50 of the world s least developed countries. The drug, Diflucan, is already being distributed free in South Africa as a treatment for cryptococca
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - A regulation that would require Pennsylvanians who test positive for the AIDS virus to be listed by name in a state database would discourage thousands of people from being tested because of confidentiality concerns, activists said Monday. Members of AIDS organizations joined a half-dozen state l
LOS ANGELES (AP) - Twenty years ago, Dr. Michael Gottlieb sent a researcher to roam a wing of the UCLA Medical Center and scout for interesting immunological cases. Bring back something interesting to discuss, Gottlieb told him. The researcher did, returning with word that a young gay man had a low white blood cell cou
LOS ANGELES (AP) - An AIDS-stricken Thai boy who was used as a decoy in an immigrant smuggling scheme cannot be returned home because it would be ``a death sentence, a federal judge said. Three-year-old Phanupong Khaisri should stay in the United States until he turns 18 and can make his own decision, Judge Dickran Tev
WASHINGTON (AP) - The government will give substantial amounts of money to local religious, community and government groups that fight AIDS, officials said Tuesday. It was 20 years to the day after federal researchers noted the first cases of the deadly disease. The Bush administration has been criticized for focusing
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) - Though more than 22 million people have died of AIDS and 36 million others are infected with HIV , the pandemic is still in its early stages, the United Nations top AIDS fighter said Tuesday as he marked 20 years since the first official report of AIDS. If the world does not act decis
SAN FRANCISCO -- A key part of the nation s blood supply could be made safe from viruses, bacteria and parasites with the use of a chemical activated by ultraviolet light, a biotech company said Monday. Cerus Corp. said it has performed hundreds of successful tests on blood products using a process it calls Helinx, whi
UNITED NATIONS -- Religious beliefs and moral values have stalled efforts to come up with a plan that would set tough new targets to combat AIDS worldwide, officials involved in negotiations said Monday. Three weeks before a draft is scheduled to go before the U.N. General Assembly, delegates from over 100 countries ha
WASHINGTON (AP) - Bono took a break from his band s Elevation tour to stop at the White House and speak with a presidential adviser about AIDS in Africa and the debt of the world s poorest countries. The lead singer of the Irish rock band U2 praised congressional support for efforts to cancel debts of poor countries ar
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Nkosi Johnson, a boy who was born with HIV and became an outspoken champion of others infected with the AIDS virus, died Friday of the disease he battled for all 12 of his years. Nkosi was praised for his openness about his infection in a country where people suspected of carrying the
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - A veteran Canadian diplomat and outspoken critic of the international community s response to the AIDS crisis was appointed Friday as special U.N. envoy for Africa on HIV and AIDS. Stephen Lewis, a former deputy director of UNICEF in the mid-1990s and a former Canadian ambassador to the United Nat
ATLANTA -- Gay men too young to remember the earliest reports of AIDS are now spreading the disease at alarming rates that remind health officials of the explosive first years of the epidemic. A six-city government survey released Thursday shows 4.4 percent of gay and bisexual men 23 to 29 years old are newly infected
WASHINGTON (AP) - As it prepares to end HIV testing of foreign applicants for employment at U.S. embassies, the State Department is acknowledging that such screening is required for candidates for the U.S. career diplomatic service. Spokesman Richard Boucher said Thursday the difference is that U.S. foreign service off
ATLANTA -- Gay men too young to remember the earliest reports of AIDS are now spreading the disease at alarming rates that remind health officials of the explosive first years of the epidemic. A government survey released Thursday shows 4.4 percent of gay and bisexual men ages 23 to 29 are newly infected each year with
WASHINGTON -- A survey of gay and lesbian high school students suggests they endure less violence and confrontation in schools where students receive gay-sensitive AIDS instruction. The survey, appearing Friday in the American Journal of Public Health, also found that gay, lesbian and bisexual students in schools witho
BEIJING -- A retired Chinese physician who publicized the dangers of AIDS said Thursday that health officials have blocked her from traveling to the United States to accept an award for her work. Dr. Gao Yaojie, 74, said health officials accused her of helping anti- China forces when she publicized
WASHINGTON -- The United States is preparing to end all HIV screening of foreign personnel hired at U.S. diplomatic posts. While testing was not a condition of employment at the 250 American missions, heads of U.S. embassies and consulates could decide whether to go ahead with tests. A State Department spokesman, P
BRUSSELS, Belgium -- The European Union urged major pharmaceutical companies on Wednesday to better coordinate their efforts to offer cheaper drugs to fight AIDS and other major diseases in Africa. It s important to give a greater coherence to the companies actions, said EU spokesman Anthony Gooch. There is no formal
WASHINGTON -- The State Department is reviewing a policy that allows more than 200 U.S. diplomatic facilities to carry out HIV screening of prospective foreign workers, an official said Tuesday night. At present, embassies have the right to turn down job applicants found to be infected with the virus. A decision to sto
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) - Secretary of State Colin Powell says his four-nation tour of Africa has put human faces on the AIDS epidemic sweeping the continent, and he ll use the experience to lobby for more U.S. aid. I can go back and make a case in Washington of the need for more resources, Powell said. I hope I can con
KAMPALA, Uganda -- Secretary of State Colin Powell on Sunday praised Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni for deciding to begin withdrawing troops from Congo and announced new food aid for drought victims in Sudan . Mr. Powell cited grave humanitarian concerns in both war-torn nations, and the State Department said it was
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Secretary of State Colin Powell told a student audience Friday that the United States would be with you every step of the way into the future but would not attempt to make peace among Africans. At the same time, Powell issued a sharp denunciation of Robert Mugabe, president of neighbor
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- Secretary of State Colin Powell promised strong U.S. support for African democracies Friday but cautioned that the United States cannot make peace among Africans. Powell faced his most critical audience yet as he outlined U.S. policy toward the continent. He encountered heckling and tough
NAIROBI, Kenya -- Glaxo SmithKline will expand a program to deliver low-cost AIDS drugs in Kenya to include aid organizations and large employee health programs, the marketing director in Kenya said Friday. Dr. William Kiarie said the company s drugs would be offered at a no-profit price, 90 percent cheaper than the re
GENEVA (AP) - The World Health Organization praised an agreement by Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis AG to slash the price of its newest anti-malaria drug for parts of Africa. The deal, signed Wednesday, could help reverse a trend in which the number of children dying of malaria in Africa has been increasing in rece
WASHINGTON (AP) - Americans don t have much stomach for involvement in Africa s myriad conflicts so Secretary of State Colin Powell is using his four-country visit to the continent to focus on health issues, especially AIDS. After a stop in Mali on Wednesday, Powell will fly to South Afr
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush suggested his Africa policy would encourage a brighter future. Colin Powell, the first black secretary of state, was heading for the continent carrying Bush s promise of continued engagement. Powell embarks Tuesday on a six-day tour of four African countries. His trip will focus on the
At the Adult Industry Medical clinic in Sherman Oaks, people talk as casually about sex as they do the weather. Have you had sex today? How many partners? Did you use a condom? Leading the discussion, five days a week, is former porn star Sharon Mitchell, 43, the executive director of the nonprofit health clinic, whose
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - Delegates from over 100 countries began debating a plan Monday calling for tough new targets to combat AIDS worldwide, including the spending of up to $10 billion a year by 2005 in developing countries. The delegates opened five days of negotiations on a declaration U.N. members are expected to ap
KIGALI, Rwanda -- First ladies from 10 African nations met Sunday to discuss how to convince their husbands - and their governments - of the need to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS on the continent. Some 26 million people in Africa are infected with the HIV virus that causes AIDS, and 55 percent of them are women, accoun
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- The new centralized call center for South Africa s AIDS Helpline would be the envy of the most high-tech of telemarketing companies. Phones softly gurgle at rows of headphone-wearing counselors sitting before a constantly updated computer database. Until a recent U.S. grant financed the t
GENEVA -- The World Health Organization stopped short of approving radical proposals Saturday for wider international access to cheap HIV/AIDS drugs. Those proposals, raised by Brazil , had called for legislative protection of local production of cheaper generic drugs, a plan criticized by multinational producers of br
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush and others have long complained that religious groups are excluded from competing for government grants. But tucked inside the Department of Health and Human Services is a grant program that excludes secular groups. Federal grants to prevent HIV and drug abuse are being offered only to
ATLANTA (AP) - The chief of the AIDS division at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is leaving to join the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Dr. Helene Gayle will join the Seattle-based foundation Sept. 1 as its senior adviser on the disease. The Gates Foundation, the personal charity of the Micros
GENEVA (AP) - Around the world, 60 million people are infected with HIV or suffering from full-blown AIDS, which already threatens to slash life expectancy in parts of Africa to less than 45 years, the U.N. secretary-general said Thursday. Kofi Annan appealed to members of the World Health Organization for more don
GENEVA (AP) - The U.N. health agency Wednesday unveiled a plan to stop the spread of tuberculosis in the hardest-hit countries, as part of a three-pronged campaign also tackling AIDS and malaria. For an extra $400 million a year, health workers will be able to provide the medicine and services needed to make major stri
WASHINGTON (AP) - The House voted Wednesday to preserve President Bush s policy of banning aid to foreign organizations that discuss or advocate abortion rights abroad. The provision, which passed 218-210, was attached to an $8.2 billion State Department reauthorization bill still being debated on the House floor. Thir
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) - South Africa s largest generic drug manufacturer said Wednesday it would seek permission from five of the world s largest pharmaceutical companies to make cut-price copies of their patented AIDS medications. While several major drug companies have recently slashed their drug prices in the
PHILADELPHIA -- The first demonstration Paul Davis attended with the AIDS advocacy group ACT UP Philadelphia was a push for better treatment for gay men with AIDS at downtown homeless shelters. Eight years later, Davis is leading ACT UP Philadelphia members to Geneva this weekend for an international conference on AIDS
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - A ski resort violated the rights of a ski patrol medic when it fired him for refusing to take an HIV test, a federal judge said Friday. A lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, which handled the case, said the ruling sets a precedent for the rights of health care workers who are, or may be
WASHINGTON (AP) - With the Nigerian president and the United Nations secretary-general at his side, President Bush on Friday pledged $200 million - and promised more money later - for fighting AIDS and other diseases ravaging Africa. The U.S. pledge is seed money for a $7 billion to $10 billion fund that U.N. Secretary
WASHINGTON -- President Bush is sending his top diplomat to AIDS-ravaged African nations and considering a request for more money to battle the deadly illness on the continent. Nations will collapse if we don t fix these problems, Secretary of State Colin Powell said Thursday. We re committed to fighting AIDS and other
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) - The campaign for access to affordable drugs in Africa has moved to Kenya, where activists urged parliament Thursday to pass legislation that would allow exemptions to international patent law. Dr. Chris Ouma, HIV/AIDS coordinator for Action Aid Kenya, said a bill currently before parliament provid
WASHINGTON (AP) - U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan (news - web sites) sought the Bush administration s help Wednesday in paying for a multibillion-dollar program to fight AIDS (news - web sites) in Africa. The administration is considering an initial pledge of $200 million to the global AIDS fund. Secretary of State C
CAIRO, Egypt -- Seven months ago, this 38-year-old engineer thought about AIDS - if he thought about it at all - with pretty much the same attitude as many others in Egypt and across the Arab world. All I knew about it was that it kills patients in a day or two at the most ... and that it hasn t reached Egypt and only
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Mining giant Anglo American is negotiating with an Indian pharmaceutical company to purchase cheap AIDS drugs for its HIV-positive workers in South Africa, a local newspaper reported Sunday. The London-based company could lose 20 percent of its South African workforce to AIDS, spokesma
BRASILIA -- President Fernando Henrique Cardoso on Thursday defended Brazil s policy of ignoring medical patents to guarantee public health, intensifying a dispute with the U.S. over patent rights. We re not here to challenge and break patents at any price, Globo Online agency quoted the president as saying at the inau
BRASILIA -- President Fernando Henrique Cardoso on Thursday defended Brazil s policy of ignoring medical patents to guarantee public health, intensifying a dispute with the U.S. over patent rights. We re not here to challenge and break patents at any price, Globo Online agency quoted the president as saying at the inau
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - Brazil s AIDS chief accused the Bush administration of protecting the interests of drug companies instead of promoting cheaper drugs to fight AIDS in developing countries. Paulo Teixeira said Wednesday his government is very surprised that President Bush has toughened the U.S. position on Brazil s
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. -- A company has been ordered to pay $347,500 in penalties for selling HIV saliva test kits without federal approval. The Food and Drug Administration has not licensed any saliva tests for the AIDS virus. SMLX Technologies Inc., of Hallandale, sold most of the kits in Latin America under the name
UNITED NATIONS -- The world s seven wealthiest nations will consider establishing a fund to combat AIDS and other infectious diseases, Italy s finance minister said Tuesday. At an upcoming summit of the industrial giants, Italy will propose that the 1,000 largest corporations in the world contribute a minimum of $500,0
PHILADELPHIA -- U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan called on philanthropists Monday for more money to combat the spread of AIDS. To wage an effective global campaign against AIDS, $7 billion to $10 billion a year is needed from governments and philanthropists, Annan said at a conference Monday. Current spending on AIDS
WASHINGTON -- World finance leaders recognized for the first time there was a need for global action in the fight against AIDS and other infectious diseases. But the United States has reservations about whether such an effort can succeed. The finance ministers and central bank governors also agreed at their weekend mee
ABUJA, Nigeria -- Developing a vaccine to prevent AIDS should be given top priority in the fight against the deadly virus sweeping Africa, a leading epidemiologist said. Efforts to develop a vaccine risked getting overlooked in the push to raise money to fight AIDS, said Seth Berkley, president of the New York-based In
WASHINGTON -- The government is warning manufacturers of drugs used in the treatment of AIDS not to imply too much in their advertising. The Food and Drug Administration acted Friday after it determined that some advertisements, particularly on the West Coast, seemed to imply that with modern treatment people did not n
ABUJA, Nigeria -- African leaders signed a joint declaration Friday urging a boost in spending in the fight against AIDS while emphasizing the need for affordable drugs to treat the millions infected on the continent. Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, speaking at the end of a two-day African summit on AIDS and rela
ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) - African governments and international relief organizations geared up Friday to defend proposals to import and produce their own cheap generic AIDS drugs - while encouraging major pharmaceutical companies to continue to cut prices to save lives of poor Africans. Overnight, leaders at a two-day
ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) - African governments geared up Friday to defend proposals to import and produce their own cheap generic AIDS drugs - while encouraging major pharmaceutical companies to continue to cut prices. Leaders at a two-day African AIDS summit debated a draft declaration proposing widespread use of so-called
New studies have cast more doubt on the idea that AIDS arose because an oral polio vaccine was contaminated with a precursor to the AIDS virus. For years, there has been speculation that the polio vaccine was grown in chimpanzee kidney cell cultures that carried the precursor virus. The virus was then passed to people
ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) - U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Thursday said global interest in fighting the spread of AIDS marks a moment of hope for Africa but that a war chest will be needed to fight the pandemic. At the start of a two-day African summit on infectious diseases, Annan said a minimum of $7 billion to $10
ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) - Young women with infants, middle-aged grandfathers and bashful teen-agers pour into the Winners Medical and Herbal Center, seeking a strong-smelling AIDS remedy that is supposed to cure the virus for life. The clinic s founder, Jacob Abdullahi, claims his two-month herbal treatment - which costs a
ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) - African ministers agreed on a draft declaration Wednesday calling on their countries to import and produce their own generic AIDS drugs and to boost spending dramatically on AIDS programs to fight the pandemic. African heads of state are expected to sign the document Thursday at the start of a two
CHICAGO (AP) - Combining two AIDS drugs works much better than standard treatment in preventing HIV transmission from mothers to babies, though there may be serious side effects, a French study suggests. Use of zidovudine - AZT - alone is generally recommended for HIV-infected pregnant women and their newborns.
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) - President Thabo Mbeki on Tuesday questioned the need for people to take HIV tests, saying there was disagreement among scientists about what exactly was being tested. Mbeki caused an international uproar more than a year ago when he courted the view of some scientists who question the lin
ATLANTA (AP) - Kristy Murray s mind raced as the plane arched across the Atlantic Ocean. She was exhausted, but there was no time for sleep. People were dying. Puzzled, she leafed through medical textbooks. What Murray knew was that drug users were turning up dead in Ireland . Ther
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Three armed men entered the room of South Africa s youngest AIDS activist early Monday, held his nurse up at gunpoint and robbed his home. No one was injured in the robbery, Nkosi Johnson s foster mother, Gail Johnson, told the South African Press Association. Nkosi, 12, contracted AID
GENEVA (AP) - The top U.N. human rights body called on governments Monday to do more to ensure people with HIV/AIDS have access to essential medicines, passing a resolution the United States called flawed. The 53-member U.N. Human Rights Commission approved a Brazilian resolution urging countries to ensure the availabi
BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) - Asia could outstrip chronically hit Africa in HIV/AIDS infections in the coming decade unless urgent action is taken to stop the spread, a U.N. official said Monday. There are clear warning sings that the epidemic could escalate in many countries if urgent action is not taken, Kathleen Cravero
NEW YORK--C. L. Clemente speaks with the bluntness of a man beyond exasperation. The Pfizer Inc. executive vice president has heard endless criticism from AIDS activists who insist loudly and often that the pharmaceutical companies are more interested in protecting their profits than ending the AIDS pandemic in Africa.
HUNTSVILLE, Ala.--AIDS has left Jenny Bragdon frail, broke and sharing a trailer on the outskirts of Huntsville with her 84 -year-old mother. Bragdon blames no one but herself for the disease she contracted in long-ago days of prostitution and drug abuse. And she doesn t begrudge the emerging crusade to fight AIDS in t
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - With the end of the government s battle against the pharmaceutical industry, a David-and-Goliath fight that made it a hero to AIDS activists, South African officials once again must confront their own spotty record on fighting the disease. They have been able to gain the moral high gro
PRETORIA, South Africa--Pharmaceutical giants entered settlement talks with the government Wednesday, signaling that they are dropping their fight against a law that could provide cheaper versions of AIDS drugs to millions of South Africans. The firms lawsuit, postponed until today as the discussions continued, has dee
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) - In a move activists hoped would lead to a flood of affordable AIDS medication to Africa, the pharmaceutical industry dropped its suit Thursday challenging a South African law many say would allow the government to import or produce generic versions of the drugs. However, the government
WASHINGTON (AP) - The United States should share the technology that makes its blood transfusions among the world s safest to help poorer countries do a better job of screening blood donations for AIDS and other infectious diseases, health workers told a federal panel Thursday. We have an opportunity to step up to the
TORONTO (AP) - Canada s high court has found the Canadian Red Cross guilty of negligence for failing to adequately screen blood donors in the early 1980s when the blood supply became infected with the AIDS virus. The tainted blood left more than 11,000 people infected with HIV or Hepatitis C - a progressive disease whi
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) - Hearings were postponed Wednesday in a case against South Africa over a 1997 law regulating medicine, as lawyers for both sides worked to settle the suit, considered a landmark case by AIDS activists. International human rights groups and AIDS activists have fought the lawsuit, which they
AUSTIN, Texas -- A man who authorities say transmitted the HIV virus through unprotected sex with at least five women has pleaded guilty to charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Lawyers say it is the first time in Texas that a person has been charged with knowingly transmitting HIV during consensual sex.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - In a city that has long promoted frank talk about AIDS, officials are considering whether to ban advertising they say uses sex to sell AIDS drugs to gay men. Tom Ammiano, president of the city Board of Supervisors, is leading the fight against pharmaceutical-company ads portraying young, buff men c
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP) - Across sub-Saharan Africa, six countries have struck deals with major Western drug-makers that will let them provide HIV treatment at a couple dollars a day per patient. Yet the accords are expected to provide the life-saving drugs for only a few thousand people, out of the 26 million HIV-in
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - A product that can emulate the work of red blood cells, transporting oxygen throughout the body, has been approved for use in South Africa, making it the first human blood substitute available anywhere in the world, the products developers announced Tuesday. Hemopure, a solution ma
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - The ads target South Africa s doctors with all the subtlety of a get-rich-quick huckster in an ill-fitting suit. $$$ New Zealand and Australia $$$ Are you ready for a change and adventure? The recent pitches, in the South African Medical Journal, ha
BAMAKO, Mali (AP) - Mali said it has reached a deal for cut-rate HIV drugs from four major Western drug companies, becoming at least the fourth African country to do so. Even at the sharply reduced rates, the Health Ministry said, treatment still will remain out of reach for most of the HIV-positive people in Mali - on
MOSCOW (AP) - Russia is facing an explosive growth in drug consumption and trade but its crime rings haven t yet plunged into the market, which is filled with a multitude of small dealers, according to a U.N.-sponsored report released Thursday. Russia s large criminal groups accumulated so much wealth during the countr
AMSTERDAM, Netherlands (AP) - Meeting with U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan , the chief executives of six major drug companies agreed Thursday to speed up the reduction of prices to help control the AIDS (news - web sites) epidemic in poor countries. The companies also agreed to consider using private aid agencies and
CAPE TOWN, South Africa -- An AIDS panel torn between mainstream and dissident scientists issued a sharply divided report Wednesday on how to deal with the disease in South Africa, with dissidents urging a halt to HIV testing and the use of AIDS medications. President Thabo Mbeki created the advisory council last year
GENEVA -- AIDS victims in poor countries would rarely benefit from a reduction in drug prices because the clinics needed to distribute them don t exist, the head of a drug manufacturers federation said Wednesday. A price reduction is like a tree falling in a forest when no one is there, said Harvey Bale, director-gener
BOSTON (AP) - Massachusetts has begun offering full health insurance to poor people with HIV, treating the condition before it reaches full-blown AIDS. The program went into effect Sunday in a state believed to be the first in the nation to fully insure low-income HIV-positive residents. Until now, residents with HIV w
CHICAGO (AP) - Hodgkin s disease and possibly two other types of cancer should be added to the list of illnesses used to determine whether HIV -infected patients have full-blown AIDS, new research suggests. The study examined more than 300,000 AIDS patients and their rates of several types of malignancies other than ca
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) - An HIV-positive man was sentenced Monday to 30 years in prison for sexually assaulting a 4-year-old boy. Gabriel Pugsley, 22, pleaded guilty last month to kidnapping and first-degree criminal sexual conduct, assault and attempted assault of the boy in the basement of the boy s apartment building last
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) - Pharmaceutical firms suing the South African government say officials have rejected or ignored their offers to provide cheap or free AIDS drugs, countering the country s claims that it needs to import cheaper generic alternatives because it cannot afford the patented drugs. To the ext
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - The AIDS Memorial Quilt dedicated to 80,000 victims of the disease left San Francisco on Friday with a tearful send-off from the city where the first of its 40,000 panels were stitched together 14 years ago. The NAMES Project Foundation is moving its AIDS Memorial Quilt to Atlanta, hoping it will h
WASHINGTON (AP) - The AIDS Drug Assistance Program is getting more medicine to more low-income patients than ever before, though wide variations among states remain, a report finds. The 13-year-old program pays for revolutionary but expensive drugs that have helped keep thousands of people with HIV alive. It is targete
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) - U.S.-based pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co. has reduced the price of two of its AIDS drugs sold in Brazil, Brazilian media reported late Friday. Merck will lower the cost of two drugs, Estado news agency reported. Indinavir
TOKYO -- In a closely watched court decision, a doctor accused of negligence in the death of a hemophiliac infected with the virus that causes AIDS was found innocent Wednesday after a four-year trial. Takeshi Abe, 84, a hemophilia expert, former professor and vice president of Teikyo University, was cleared of the cha
NORTH CHICAGO, Ill. (AP) - Abbott Laboratories said Tuesday it will make its two AIDS drugs and HIV diagnostic test available in AIDS-ravaged Africa at no profit, becoming the latest pharmaceutical giant to bow to international pressure on the issue. Subject to the price cuts are its protease-inhibitor drugs,
OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) - A few years ago, an author writing about death asked ailing AIDS patient Michael Alcalay how he was accepting dying. I m not accepting it, Alcalay retorted. Alcalay is alive today thanks in part, he believes, to doses of marijuana that helped him keep his medicines down and appetite up as he foug
FULTON, Mo. (AP) - It has 20 bedrooms, 11 guards and an annual budget of $215,720. But the state hospital wing that houses Angela Coffel has only one patient. Missouri opened the wing for Coffel last August, after she completed her prison term for molesting two boys. She is being held under a law that allows the state
WASHINGTON (AP) - The United States should give sub-Sahara African countries $1 billion a year in additional aid and debt relief to help them combat widespread hunger, an advocacy group said Wednesday. Such a commitment would prompt other industrialized nations to join the effort and generate an additional $3 billion i
PRETORIA, South Africa The AIDS virus savaging this nation is still spreading, government officials said Tuesday, as they announced that half a million more South Africans were infected with HIV last year. The new statistics confirm that South Africa remains the epicenter of the global AIDS epidemic, with 4.7 million p
GENEVA (AP) - The U.N. health agency is launching a campaign to fight the AIDS-fueled spread of tuberculosis by providing high-quality drugs to 10 million patients in the hardest-hit countries. Tuberculosis kills 2 million people every year and is the world s leading curable infectious killer, the World Hea
WASHINGTON (AP) - Using the same law Republicans employed to overturn Clinton administration workplace rules, several lawmakers want to remove abortion restrictions that President Bush imposed on foreign aid. The five Senate Republicans and two Democrats introduced a resolution Tuesday expressing disapproval for the Bu
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) - South Africa, which already has the world s largest population of HIV-positive people, said Tuesday the numbers were even higher than previously thought, with one in nine infected. A government study conducted at 400 clinics nationwide concluded that about 4.7 million South Africans were H
KIEV (AP)--An international aid organization Monday launched an anti-AIDS program in Ukraine , where the disease is spreading swiftly but AIDS awareness remains low. The France-based Doctors Without Borders - or Medecins sans Frontieres - presented a one-year educational project to make more Ukrainians aware of AIDS an
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP) - Far from the big courtroom battle over HIV drug patents in South Africa , the West African nation of Ivory Coast quietly imports knockoff generic HIV drugs as it has for years - without fuss, patent payments or apologies. Believe me, I don t care, Kassim Sidibe, director of Ivory Coast
OSLO, Norway (AP) - Experts will gather next month in Norway to discuss how to provide affordable medicine to developing nations, which are often are the worst afflicted by diseases such as AIDS. About 50 international experts are expected at the April 8-11 conference, which was jointly announced Sunday by the World He
Despite their high prices, AIDS drug cocktails have proved their worth in the United States , saving an average of $2,000 a year in medical costs per patient by keeping people out of the hospital, Rand Corp. researchers say. In a separate study, researchers calculated that AIDS drugs cost about $20,000 in the United St
EDINBURGH, Scotland (AP) - A Scottish man who infected his girlfriend with the AIDS virus was sentenced Friday to five years in jail. Stephen Kelly was convicted last month of culpable and reckless conduct in having unprotected sex with a 34-year-old woman in 1994 even though he knew he was infected with HIV, the virus
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP) - The sudden wave of cost cuts in HIV drugs for Africa was welcomed Thursday in struggling clinics like Marc Aguirre s, where poor patients receive care on four beds in a converted garage. But only as a start. Even at drug companies newly promised prices - at- or below-cost for some key drugs
NEW YORK -- Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. says it will sell two AIDS medications at below cost to African countries, a decision hailed by activists who have been urging drug makers to drastically reduce prices in poverty-stricken nations. The action, announced Wednesday, comes on the heels of an announcement by Merck and Co
Despite their high prices, AIDS drug cocktails have proved their worth in the United States , saving an average of $2,000 a year in medical costs per patient by keeping people out of the hospital, researchers say. In a separate study, researchers calculated that AIDS drugs cost about $20,000 in the United States for ea
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) - President Thabo Mbeki rejected calls Wednesday to declare a state of emergency to allow South Africa to import generic, cheaper drugs to deal with its AIDS crisis. Most of the 4.5 million South Africans estimated to be HIV-positive cannot afford the drugs that could prolong their lives. D
GABORONE, Botswana -- Botswana, the country with the world s highest rate of HIV infection, hopes to begin providing anti-retroviral medication by year s end to all who need it, President Festus Mogae said Wednesday. The plan would make Botswana one of a half-dozen countries in Africa to develop programs to make AIDS d
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Opposition leaders said they would urge the president to invoke a state of emergency to give South Africans with HIV access to cheaper generic drugs. That won t happen, the country s health minister, Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, said Tuesday. Invoking a state of emergency won t solve the
BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) - U.S.-based drug giant Merck & Co. said Monday that it will include Romania, where the overwhelming majority of people suffering from AIDS are children, on a list of nations eligible for AIDS drugs at sharply reduced prices. A company official said Merck is slashing the price of two dru
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP) - Ivory Coast s government said Saturday it had reached agreements with three leading pharmaceutical companies to slash the price of lifesaving HIV drugs. The deal with Bristol-Myers Squibb , Merck & Co. , and GlaxoSmithKline will reduce the cost
WASHINGTON (AP) - A study showing that inoculated monkeys stayed healthy despite exposure to a high dose of an AIDS virus gives new evidence that AIDS can be controlled by a vaccine, researchers say. Researchers writing Friday in the journal Science said the new vaccine uses a one-two-three punch to develop an immune s
WASHINGTON (AP) - In a study giving new evidence that AIDS can be controlled by vaccine, inoculated monkeys stayed healthy despite exposure to high levels of virus, researchers say. The new vaccine is being fast-tracked toward human testing. In a report appearing Friday in the journal Science, researchers said the vacc
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- After years of little movement toward bringing affordable AIDS medication to the developing world, two momentous announcements - one by a mainstream drug company, the other by a generic manufacturer - offered hope that some of Africa s tens of millions of infected people might one day get
Women newly diagnosed with HIV have far less virus in their blood than men at the same stage, a study found. The difference disappears later, according to the study at Johns Hopkins University. The finding is unlikely to affect treatment, because the treatment guidelines were changed between the time the article was wr
GENEVA -- The United Nations health body on Wednesday retracted a statement backing the South African government in a court battle with pharmaceutical companies. The World Health Organization said there had been a mistake when a spokesman said Tuesday that the agency believed South Africa s law did not break internatio
WHITEHOUSE STATION, N.J. (AP) - Pharmaceutical manufacturer Merck & Co. announced that it will drastically lower prices for two HIV -treatment drugs in developing countries. In a statement Wednesday, the company said it will not profit when selling the two protease-inhibitor drugs in developing countries, including
GABORONE, Botswana -- Botswana s national diamond company, Debswana, said it plans to start subsidizing life-prolonging drugs for HIV-positive employees. The company said it will pay 90% of the cost of anti-retroviral treatment for HIV-positive employees and HIV-positive spouses of employees. Botswana jointly owns
CHICAGO (AP) - An AIDS cocktail without a protease inhibitor - the drug that has transformed the disease from a death sentence - appears to suppress the virus just as well, offering a potential alternative to patients who have become resistant to treatment, researchers say. The study compared results in patients treate
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) - Drug companies on Tuesday asked a court to postpone hearings in a suit against a law on drug patents - a case activists say could be a watershed in efforts to get AIDS medicines to poor countries. A lawyer for the Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association told the judge his clients needed m
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) - Pamela Mandela smiles shyly, then grimaces as a needle carrying the first AIDS vaccine specifically designed for Africa sinks into her left arm. I went into the medical profession to alleviate human suffering, but with AIDS, I have often found myself not able to help, says the 31-year-old doctor,
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) - Pharmaceutical companies faced off in court Monday against the South African government in a case that activists say is a landmark in the developing world s efforts to get cheap AIDS medications. More than three dozen drug companies are suing the government to try to overturn a 1997 law th
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) - Thousands of people protesting the high cost of AIDS medications marched on the U.S. Embassy on Monday while manufacturers asked a judge to throw out a law activists say is needed to get AIDS drugs to the poor. The demonstrators in Pretoria, South Africa s capital, want the
WASHINGTON (AP) - Nearly 50,000 people with AIDS in cities like Los Angeles and New York get government help paying their rent. Not so, for those in towns like Anchorage, Fargo and Wichita. President Bush wants to expand the housing program started in 1992, when his father was president. The recommendation was viewed b
BOMBAY, India (AP) - An international aid agency said it will distribute an anti-AIDS drug purchased from an Indian company free of charge in 10 countries. Doctors Without Borders will buy the anti-AIDS cocktail from the Indian company Cipla Ltd. In general, where the Cipla drug will be used, it will be supplied f
ATLANTA (AP) - An outbreak of syphilis in Southern California last year has provided alarming new evidence that gay and bisexual men are lowering their guard against AIDS, the government said. More than half of the syphilis cases in a four-county area during the first half of 2000 were in men who reported having had at
NEW YORK (AP) - Pharmaceutical manufacturer Merck & Co. has begun a small-scale human trial of a new experimental HIV vaccine, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday. The new vaccine has been able to prevent laboratory monkeys exposed to an extremely virulent strain of the disease from contracting it, sources cl
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) - Expanding an international campaign to make AIDS drugs affordable in the poorest nations, an American priest who works with HIV-positive orphans in Kenya said Wednesday he planned to import cheap, generic medicines from India . Importing the drugs, which are the equivalents of patented medicines,
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - The U.S. pharmaceutical giant Pfizer will begin distributing the drug Diflucan on a free basis to HIV and AIDS patients at government hospitals and clinics within the next few weeks, the health department and Pfizer said Wednesday. The department has removed a roadblock to the drug
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - It is now possible to dramatically reduce the spread and impact of AIDS, and the most important factor is global and national leadership, Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Tuesday. In a report which will serve as the backdrop to the U.N. General Assembly s special session on the AIDS crisis in Jun
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) - Pudgy arms poking from his neatly ironed T-shirt, Vitor Daniel chases a playmate with the boundless energy of a healthy two-year-old. His round, ruddy face could hardly be less like the stereotype of a Third World AIDS child. Give me, give me, he screams, lunging to play with the clear pla
BANGKOK, Thailand -- Porntip Kesornbua s last day at the Human Development AIDS hospice is much the same as the previous four months. Life for the patients is a mixture of boredom and simple pleasures. Nurses and attendants wearing white cotton masks and latex gloves methodically clean and care for those too ill to hel
NEW YORK (AP) - Pfizer Corp. has halted some clinical trials of a painkilling medication after federal regulators voiced concern over a study suggesting the medication increased incidence of tumors in mice. New York-based Pfizer sent written notices Monday to hospitals and research centers to stop giving the drug prega
LONDON (AP) - The relief agency Oxfam is taking aim at the pharmaceutical industry and governments of developed nations, accusing them of keeping lifesaving medicines beyond the reach of the world s poor. In the latest chapter in a growing campaign to broaden access to essential medicines, Oxfam said Monday that drug c
WASHINGTON--Mutations in the human genome predispose or cause at least 1,500 diseases, ranging from diabetes and asthma to cancer and heart attack. But why these mutations prompt these diseases is imperfectly understood and patients suffer and die for reasons that still befuddle medical science. The connection between
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) - South Africa s president issued a glowing assessment of the country s prospects Friday, saying poor blacks have progressed despite the economic gap between the races. In his annual State of the Nation speech to Parliament, President Thabo Mbeki highlighted the nation s advances in the sev
NEW YORK (AP) - The man accepted a bag full of condoms and disappeared into the subway station. Marcus Warren-Wright and his three AIDS outreach colleagues moved on, calling out: Check this out, we re giving out free condoms. You know, the rate for HIV and AIDS is going up in our black community. An alarming 30 percent
CHICAGO (AP) - People who catch HIV are increasingly likely to encounter mutant forms of the virus that are able to resist some of the drugs commonly used to treat the infection. Drug-resistant strains have been a major problem since the start of treatment in the early years of the AIDS epidemic, but until recently thi
WASHINGTON (AP) -- After a confused morning scramble, the White House announced Wednesday that President Bush will keep offices on AIDS and race relations created by his predecessor. We re concerned about AIDS inside our White House, make no mistake about it, Bush told reporters after a South Lawn ceremony on tax cuts.
NEW DELHI, India (AP) - An Indian drug company has offered to sell an AIDS cocktail that costs $10,000 a year per patient to an international aid agency for only $350, the company s chairman said Wednesday. The decision by Bombay-based Cipla Ltd. could revolutionize the treatment of HIV patients in developing countries
CHICAGO (AP) - A government campaign intended to break the back of the AIDS epidemic will try to cut the number of new infections in half by 2005, largely by identifying Americans who carry HIV but do not know it. The effort, announced Tuesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is based on the idea that
CHICAGO (AP) - A stunning one-third of young gay black men in large U.S. cities are infected with HIV, another sign of the growing racial divide in the AIDS epidemic. The findings, based on a study released Monday, show that HIV infections are disturbingly common among gay men of all races in their 20s, especially cons
CHICAGO (AP) - A new generation of AIDS medicines in development may outwit HIV s uncanny ability to grow resistant to standard drugs. The drugs are a form of protease inhibitor, the main ingredient of drug cocktails that have revolutionized the treatment of AIDS. A main drawback of these drugs is they lose power when
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - A new South African project to provide free AIDS medication to some HIV positive pregnant women has given activists hope the government is abandoning its controversial approach to the disease and beginning to fight the threat in earnest. The government had previously argued it lacked t
WASHINGTON (AP) - New guidelines for the use of antiretroviral AIDS drugs call for starting the therapy later in the course of the disease for patients who show no symptoms. The guidelines, still being fine-tuned, recommend waiting until patients have higher levels of virus in their blood and lower levels of white bloo
HOMA BAY, Kenya -- Suffering a second bout of tuberculosis, Anita Robi sits on her hospital bed unsure of her fate now that the Netherlands government has decided to cut off aid that helps Kenya buy TB drugs. I don t know who has been paying for the drugs, but if they were not helping, I would never get to recover.
DAVOS, Switzerland -- Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates pledged $100 million to the search for an AIDS vaccine and challenged the rich and powerful at the World Economic Forum to pitch in as well. Yahoo! on Saturday also promised $5 million over three years - the first corporate sponsor of the International AIDS Vaccine
LONDON -- The number of people in Britain diagnosed last year with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, is expected to be the highest ever, public health officials said Thursday. The Public Health Laboratory Service said 2,868 new cases of HIV were reported last year, a 7 percent increase on comparable figures for 1999. Wi
NEW YORK -- The AIDS virus is striking hardest in New York City today among young black men, a new survey has found, with 33 percent of gay or bisexual black men ages 23 to 29 testing positive for HIV. The study conducted by the city s Health Department found that young black New Yorkers are experiencing a larger burde
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - U.S. Ambassador Richard Holbrooke pressed the United Nations on Friday to better educate U.N. peacekeepers about AIDS so they don t spread the deadly virus themselves. Holbrooke spent his last full day in office debating an issue that he first brought to the Security Council a year ago: That U.N.
WASHINGTON (AP) - Two manufacturers of unapproved AIDS (news - web sites) tests sold over the Internet settled government charges Tuesday that bar them from misrepresenting such tests accuracy. The settlements bring to six the number of marketers cited in a federal crackdown of unapproved home AIDS tests since 1999, wh
A genetically engineered protein is able in laboratory tests to keep the AIDS virus from infecting cells. Researchers said it has promise of being used as a powerful therapy against the disease. Dr. Peter Kim of the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (news - web sites)
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - With a squeeze so faint that it s hardly detectable, South Africa s youngest AIDS (news - web sites) activist let his big sister know that yes, he would like to sit in the garden tomorrow. If he lives until tomorrow, that is. Nkosi Johnson, 11, is dying of AIDS, the illness he has devo
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Nkosi Johnson, who at age 11 has become one of South Africa s most well-known AIDS activists, is seriously ill, his doctor said Saturday. The boy, who was born infected with the virus that causes AIDS, became unconscious after suffering convulsions a week ago, said Dr. Ashraf Coovadia
WASHINGTON (AP) - Three pregnant women with the AIDS (news - web sites) virus recently died from a severe side effect caused by taking two AIDS drugs together, the government said Friday in warning pregnant women to try to avoid a combination of the drugs ddI and d4T . Four other pregnant women suffered nonfat
ATLANTA (AP) - At least 22 people have suffered serious side effects, including liver failure, from taking an AIDS (news - web sites) drug that was prescribed to prevent HIV infection in people accidentally exposed to the virus. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (news - web sites) advised doctors Thur
ATLANTA (AP) - At least 22 people have suffered serious side effects, including liver failure, from taking an AIDS (news - web sites) drug intended to prevent HIV infection after accidental exposure to the virus. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention documented two cases in health care workers and foun
Harsh is a word that could describe the streets of Chicago s struggling Austin neighborhood, where trust is scarce--and where two men walking hand in hand might fear for their lives. It s the sort of place where Derrick Hicks, who is gay and HIV-positive, could wither away unnoticed, another statistic for a dusty filin
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