Bamako, Mali (PANA) - Mali s Sharing Foundation chaired by Adam Ba Konare, President Omar Konare s wife, will Saturday organise a function called Synchro-SIDA to highlight the fight against AIDS in the country. Under a Culture, Solidarity and AIDS project, Synchro-SIDA will be a broadcasting day of information and sens
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - Ghana has contracted a 25 million US dollars to augment the 15 percent national health budget to be allocated to the fight against HIV/AIDS, the country s Vice President Aliu Mahama announced Tuesday. Mahame urged the private sector to also commit financial and materials resources in addition to e
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - Some 76,800 condoms were distributed during the four-day 12th International Conference on AIDS and STDs in Africa (ICASA) held last week in Ouagadougou, a condom marketing agent revealed. Yacouba Tou, commercial officer at the association for the social promotion and marketing of cond
Bamako, Mali (PANA) - Nearly 30 percent of Malian prostitutes are HIV-positive, according to an epidemiological survey conducted January-May this year throughout the country by the health ministry. The finding of the survey, issued in Bamako Monday, also shows a high proportion of AIDS sufferers among mobile vendors (6
New York, US (PANA) - The US House of Representatives has set the tone for enhanced US financing of the global AIDS campaign by approving nearly 1.3 billion dollars for AIDS programmes in the new fiscal year. The bill provides that 750 million dollars be contributed to the Global AIDS Trust Fund being set up by the UN
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - A Kenyan member of parliament who has advocated for the practice of female genital mutilation (FGM) to continue has this week hit the headlines again - by demanding that all Kenyan men must be circumcised, too, as part of the war against HIV/AIDS. Peter Angwenyi, a former University of Nairobi l
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - The Methodist Church in Kenya has translated the English version of a book it produced on HIV/AIDS, into local languages, in a bid to reach a larger readership with the message highlighting the dangers of the scourge. The Church s regional health and development co-ordinator, Florence Murugu sai
Lusaka, Zambia (PANA) - The Planned Parenthood Association of Zambia (PPAZ) has shifted focus from Family Planning to youth sexuality and reproductive health, PPAZ secretary general Alice Lungu said. The Zambian News Agency (ZANA) quoted Lungu as explaining that because of the increasing impact of HIV/AIDS in the count
Lusaka, Zambia (PANA) - Zambian authorities have expressed concern at the death from HIV/AIDS of 93 teachers in the Copperbelt region alone, in the last two years. According Irene Malambo, who is HIV/AIDS coordinator at the ministry of Education, the ministry has set up a prevention programme countrywide for teachers a
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - Nigeria s efforts to produce its own HIV/AIDS vaccine would formally take off in 2002, when a vaccine plan would be launched, according to a top official of the National Action Committee on AIDS (NACA). NACA Chairman Ibironke Akinsete said in Abuja Friday the Committee charged with producing the
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - The 12th International Conference on AIDS and STDs in Africa (ICASA) ended Thursday evening in Ouagadougou with a recommendation to switch from prevention to treatment in efforts to control the pandemic. Speaking at the closing ceremony, ICASA chairman Prof. Robert Soudre noted that t
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - An alternate technique for the counting of CD4-lymphocytes in the human body, developed by the Muraz Centre of Bobo Dioulasso in western Burkina Faso, in collaboration with the France s National AIDS Research Agency (ANRS), was presented to the public Thursday. It is worth noting
Johannesburg, South Africa (PANA) - A high court in Pretoria on Friday ordered the South African government to start supplying anti-AIDS drugs to pregnant mothers living with HIV, which leads to the incurable AIDS. President Thabo Mbeki s government will now be forced to provide these drugs to prevent mother to child t
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya s Attorney General Amos Wako Thursday extended for a further six months, the mandate of a task force recently appointed to look into legal issues relating to HIV/AIDS in the country. The body, which was expected to submit its final report by 31 December 2001, now has up to 30 June 2002 to
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - African countries most affected by AIDS need to be aware of the significance of the incurable disease, the chairman of the Global Foundation for AIDS Research and Prevention, Prof. Luc Montagnier, has said. In an interview with PANA in Ouagadougou during the 12th International Confere
Harare, Zimbabwe (PANA) - A scientific research institute in Zimbabwe said Thursday it had found that a variety of local traditional herbal medicines cured AIDS symptoms, particularly mental disorders. The Blair Research Institute said it had found that herbal medicines used by traditional healers to treat HIV and AIDS
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - Pharmacists in Burkina Faso have agreed to forgo profits emerging from the sale of antiretrovirals drugs in the country. Victoire Benao, president of the national pharmacists association, announced the decision in Ouagadougou on Wednesday during a press conference held at the fringes
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - Acc‚l‚rer l AccŠs , a joint initiative by the World health organization (WHO), the World Bank and five pharmaceutical companies, is improving access to health care for AIDS patients in Africa. Partners in the project have mobilised financial resources to the tune of one billion US dol
Yaounde, Cameroon (PANA) - The government of Cameroon has announced a price cut on drugs, anti-retrovirals, treatment of opportunistic infections and essential medical components in the country s various provision centres and public hospitals. The decrease, which reaches 67 percent on some generic products, will be fin
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - The World Health Organisation (WHO) Tuesday recommended in Ouagadougou the validation of the efficiency, the harmlessness and the quality of traditional medicine and remedies which offer an alternative for the management of HIV/AIDS and opportunistic infections. Highly represented
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - Eric Gbodossou, a Senegal-based medical doctor, who also practices herbal medicine, says traditional medicine can cure several opportunistic infections associated with HIV/AIDS. Gbodossou, President of NGO for the Promotion of Traditional Medicines under the French acronym PROMETRA,
Niamey, Niger (PANA) - AIDS patients in Niger will have to wait for some time before they gain access to triple therapy, National AIDS Control Programme director Kari Moukaila has said. Although triple therapy was the standard treatment for relieving pain in an AIDS patient, he said only two types of drugs were availab
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - Burkina Faso Human and People s Rights Movement has urged African governments to opt for a curative approach in their fight against AIDS. The movement s head, Halidou Ouedraogo, made the call Monday in his address to delegates attending the 12th International Conference on AIDS and Se
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - The African Union against Sexually Transmitted Diseases Sunday in Ouagadougou awarded an honorary distinction on the fight against HIV/AIDS to President Blaise Compaore of Burkina Faso. The award, announced at the ongoing international conference on sexually transmitted diseases and A
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - Speakers at the African Youth forum against HIV/AIDS holding in Ouagadougou Saturday challenged the continent s youth to come up with new strategies against the pandemic by the time the conference ends on 13 December. International Conference on AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Diseases
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - The start of an ambitious health care project aimed at providing access to anti-retroviral drugs for AIDS sufferers in Nigeria was mired in uncertainty Monday. One Health Ministry official in Abuja, who asked not to be identified, said the programme did not start as scheduled due to the absence
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - The head of the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS, Dr Peter Piot, has said the commitments made at international conferences this year must be met if the epidemic is to be effectively pushed back in Africa and other seriously affected areas. Turning back the epidemic requires nothing mor
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - President Blaise Compaore of Burkina Faso has declared AIDS as a major development crisis in African countries, where it is decimating the most economically active sections of the population. Compaore said this in Ouagadougou Sunday evening at the official opening of the 12th Internat
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - The Benin government has set up a Committee for the prevention of HIV/AIDS in the country s schools and Universities. Officials say the Committee would supervise and co-ordinate HIV/AIDS campaigns targeting young people. Committee Co-ordinator Avode Dossou Gilbert said the school is important,
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - Mozambique is facing a challenge which, if not overcome, will compromise the country s social and economic development efforts , President Joaquim Chissano warned on Friday. The president was speaking of the threat posed by the lethal disease AIDS to the country s development. Opening a
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa s Road Freight Association (RFA) is injecting three million rand (about 280,000 US dollars) into the country s fight against AIDS, in conjunction with Department of Health. Officials said the grant would be used on AIDS policies and programmes in the long-distance trucking
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Tanzanian health experts have reported a drastic increase of HIV cases in urban centres situated along the 1,000-km Tanzania- Zambia highway. A recent study conducted in Mbarali district in the south-western Tanzania region of Mbeya attributed the high HIV transmission rate to high leve
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - Mozambican Prime Minister Pascoal Mocumbi on Thursday stressed the importance of involving the country s working class in the struggle against AIDS. Opening a Labour Ministry national seminar on combating HIV/AIDS at the workplace, Mocumbi urged the meeting to activate all possible means to
Paris, France (PANA) - Migrants Against AIDS , AIDS Info Service (immigrants radio), AIDS Info Immigrants , says a broadcast on Paris-based FM 106.3 in initiatives to involve migrant populations in the fight against AIDS in France. The first control effort is to provide access to information on the disease, followed by
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - The Kenyan office of UNICEF Wednesday said that it would lay more emphasis on HIV/AIDS in its programmes for the next two and half years, in a major policy shift that will see 60 percent of the UN body s resources devoted to the scourge. UNICEF Country Office Representative, Nicholas Alipui, obs
Blantyre, Malawi (PANA) - A World Bank report says that six out of every 10 patients admitted to Malawi s hospitals are HIV positive, a situation that is over-burdening the country s health ministry. The report says that up to 50 percent of admissions in medical wards and 85 percent of admissions in TB wards are HIV po
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - A cartel of American firms are against the manufacture or import of cheap generic anti-retrovirals (ARVs) by Kenyan pharmaceutical companies, a parliamentarian claimed Tuesday. Newton Kulundu told Parliament that despite Kenya s Industrial Property Act passed in August this year, the government
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - Senegal has been equipped with a second anonymous and voluntary HIV/AIDS screening centre based in Kaolack, the third most populated city. The first centre was established years ago in Dakar, the capital. Kaolack (with 90,000 inhabitants) was chosen mainly because the prevalence rate of 1.8 perc
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - In a bid to protect unborn babies against infection with HIV, a non-governmental organisation in Botswana Tuesday started teaching HIV-positive women about proper use of anti-retrovirals. Under what it has dubbed buddies programme , the Coping Centre for People Living With Aids (COCEPWA) has
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - The 12th International Conference on AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STDs) in Africa (ICASA), opens in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso Sunday, to examine new approaches in the fight against the diseases. Professor Robert Soudre, Organising chair of the week-long Conference, also said the meeti
Saint Denis, Reunion (PANA) - Malagasy film director, Solo Randrasana warns in his latest production, Liza, against trivialising AIDS in the country where explosive relaxation of sexual behaviours exists. The movie is an educational tool which exists in French and Malagasy versions to target urban and rural communities
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA)- Botswana President Festus Mogae has been awarded the Harvard AIDS Institute s 2001 AIDS leadership award in recognition of his contribution in the fight against HIV/AIDS. Mogae becomes the first African head of state to receive the award given annually to people who have shown outstanding vis
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - Nigeria s efforts to stem its rising HIV/AIDS cases have received a boost with a five-year project by the US Harvard School of Public Health. The AIDS Prevention Initiative in Nigeria (APIN) project, has designed a number of intervention activities in three pilot States - Lagos and Oyo, both in
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - Nigeria s efforts to stem its rising HIV/AIDS cases have received a boost with the take-off of a five-year project by the US Harvard School of Public Health. The AIDS Prevention Initiative in Nigeria (APIN) project, has designed a number of intervention activities in three pilot States - Lagos a
Monrovia, Liberia (PANA) - Chief justice Gloria Scott of the supreme court of Liberia is calling for a national debate on the legal framework to protect those infected with HIV/AIDS, the local press reported Monday. Scott said such forum should involve lawyers, doctors, caregivers, social workers, civil society and mem
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - Nigeria s efforts to stem its rising HIV/AIDS cases have received a boost with the take-off of a five-year project by the US Harvard School of Public Health. The AIDS Prevention Initiative in Nigeria (APIN) project, has designed a number of intervention activities in three pilot States - Lagos a
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Beautiful Rose Atieno, 18, is an orphan whose parents succumbed to the dreaded HIV/AIDS some years ago. Her father died when she was only five and her mother, who had to fend for the family of five children from her vegetable-vending business, followed three years later. For Atieno, life has
Saint Denis, Reunion (PANA) - Reunion is probably one of the few African regions where the AIDS epidemic, first reported on the island in 1987, was quickly brought under control. The belated outbreak of the disease enabled Reunion to draw from the experience of continental France , w
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Sharp reductions in prices of antiretrovirals (ARVs) announced by two leading pharmaceutical companies, and frenzied efforts by a Nairobi hospital to provide affordable treatment to HIV/AIDS patients, is revolutionising the management of the pandemic in Kenya. It is hoped that a further redu
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - With 620,000 AIDS patients in 1997, representing an HIV prevalence rate of 7,71 percent, Burkina Faso is the third most affected country in West Africa, behind Cote d Ivoire and Togo . According to a UNDP report on the evolution of HIV/AIDS in Burkina Faso, the HI
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Some 10,000 people thronged Nairobi s Nyayo Stadium to listen and dance to music laden with strong anti-AIDS messages marking World AIDS Day. The day, marked world-wide on every 1 December since its start 1998, turned into a day of entertainment and family funs as parents, accompanied by their c
Quelimane, Mozambique (PANA) - Mozambican President Joaquim Chissano has urged citizens to break their taboos by speaking about AIDS simply and very clearly . In an address Saturday in the central province of Zambezia, during observance of the International Day of Struggle Against AIDS, Chissano broke one of the major
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa, the country with the highest recorded AIDS cases in the world, observed World AIDS Day with dozens of rallies, marches and speeches throughout the country. Of the 40 million people living with HIV/AIDS in the world, more than 4 million are in South Africa. Even this 4 mill
Harare, Zimbabwe (PANA) - A recent press report that six Zimbabwean cabinet ministers had AIDS, though unconfirmed, has re-focused the attention of the public on the disease as the southern African nation joined other countries Saturday in marking World AIDS Day. The weekly Financial Gazette newspaper, quoting a medica
Monrovia, Liberia (PANA) - Clad in T-shirts with messages inscribed on them and carrying banners about the danger of HIV/AIDS, hundreds of Liberians paraded the streets of Monrovia to mark World AIDS Day. For some hours, the marchers kept the traffic moving at a snail s pace around the city. It is this year that th
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Almost two decades after it was first reported in Tanzania, AIDS has become the biggest threat to the country s development after malaria. The Government of Tanzania, like many others in sub-Saharan Africa, depends on a small number of highly skilled personnel in almost all areas of pub
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - Ghana s president, John Agyekum Kufuor on Saturday urged district assemblies to assist traditional leaders to develop community based initiatives to help curb the spread of the HIV/AIDS that is gradually wiping away the population. He said in a speech read on his behalf at this year s World AIDS D
Monrovia, Liberia (PANA) - On the heels of the observance of World AIDS Day, a pharmaceutical company here has announced the arrival on the Liberian market of the first commercial consignment of anti-HIV/AIDS drugs. Prior to the import of the drugs, anti-retroviral drugs available in the country were donations from phi
Tripoli, Libya (PANA) - The HIV/AIDS pandemic continues to rise in Libya, according to official statistics released on World AIDS Day. Between January and October 2001, the Libyan National Committee against HIV/AIDS (CNLLS) recorded 319 new infections. Of these, 266 were males, 45 women and eight children. Foreign
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - Calls for positive behaviour change and unity in the fight against AIDS, dominated the commemoration of the World AIDS Day in Botswana Saturday. President Festus Mogae, leading the campaign under the global theme: I care, do you,? stressed the need for citizens to change their attitude towar
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - A young man made a fatal mistake on his 24th birthday and has a painful confession to make. He had thought that AIDS was a spiritual sickness associated with a category of people, especially women I therefore counted myself out, but I have been proved wrong, confessed young man Kofi, who is HIV
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - Rattled by the rising HIV infection in the country, Nigeria s federal government has mapped out a multi-pronged plan to stem new infections and cater for people already infected. The plan includes massive enlightenment campaigns, management of sexually transmitted diseases, prevention of mother-
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - President John Agyekm Kufuor has become Ghana s chief campaigner against AIDS, and on Friday he urged men to get more involved in the fight against the pandemic. He said the notion that having unprotected sex was a demonstration of their manhood should be discarded. Let us treat our women fol
New York, UN (PANA) - Intensified global attention to it in the recent past notwithstanding, the HIV/AIDS epidemic accelerated in the world in 2001, with other regions racing to catch up with Africa, the hotbed of the disease, UN data has shown. In its reports to mark this year s World AIDS Day on 1 December,
Kinshasa, DR Congo (PANA) – DR Congo President Jos eph Kabila Friday pledged more active participation in the anti-AIDS fight. The Congolese leader made the commitment during discussions with visiting WHO Regional Director for Africa, Ebrahim Malik Samba. Samba, who is in Kinshasa for Saturday s World AIDS Day activiti
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - The HIV/AIDS prevalence rate in Senegal dropped from 1.8 percent in 1999 to 1.4 percent in 2000, with sufferers estimated at 80,000, official sources affirmed Friday in Dakar. According to figures at the ministry of Health and Prevention, the country recorded 5 000 AIDS-related deaths in 2000, b
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - Botswana is hosting a workshop of scientists, pharmacists and donor agencies seeking to establish networks of HIV vaccine trials in the southern Africa. The workshop, which comes only a day before the commemoration of the World AIDS Day (WAD) Saturday, is seeking to involve all countries in
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - As the World marks the AIDS Day, Saturday (December 1), the joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS ( UNAIDS ), says the global fight has reached a crossroads . This year, we have reached a crossroads. In a charged and changed world, our test is whether we can begin to decisively roll back the epidemic,
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - The number of Nigerians infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, has increased from 2.6 million in 1999 to three million in 2001, according to a report on the latest National HIV/Syphilis Sentinel Survey. The report released by the federal government Thursday, ahead of the December 1 World
Yaounde, Cameroon (PANA) - There is a growing wave of HIV/AIDS infection in Cameroon where prevalence rate which was 0.5 percent in 1987, reached 1 percent in 1990, 4.89 percent in 1997 and 7.2 percent in 1998. According to statistics at the national committee on the fight against AIDS (CNLS), the prevalence rate is cu
Yaounde, Cameroon (PANA) - In observance of national AIDS control week, the government of Cameroon said it has launched an operation dubbed 100 percent condoms meant to augment other activities undertaken by the National AIDS Control Committee for 2000-2003. The committee has embarked on the prevention of HIV/AIDS and
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - In a bid to deepen public understanding of HIV/AIDS care issues, 7,000 volunteers on Friday began working door-to-door across South Africa s Gauteng province. They will use seven million stickers and 2.5 million pamphlets in their attempt to reach over three million people. The camp
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - Youths from Togo and Benin launched on Thursday in Cotonou an operation known as Crusade for Revival whose objective is to combat AIDS in Africa. The youths expressed their determination to use methodologies initiated by ACS Worldwide and the NGO World Peace to effectively control the AIDS scour
Blantyre, Malawi (PANA) - This year s commemoration of World AIDS Day in Malawi will be held at the Kwacha Conference Centre in Blantyre on Saturday, the country s deputy minister of Health Elizabeth Lamba said in Blantyre. She commended the choice of this year s World AIDS Day theme: Young men and HIV/AIDS, with the
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - The head of UNICEF said Thursday that one of the most troubling and complex aspects of the spread of HIV/AIDS is its link to the widespread sexual exploitation of children. Whether it is myths about the curative powers of sex with young girls, or macho attitudes that sanction violent sexual beha
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - The Mozambican parliament Thursday unanimously approved a bill aimed at protecting workers who are HIV-positive against discrimination at the workplace. The bill will make it illegal to fire workers merely because they are suffering from AIDS, or test positive for HIV, the virus that causes
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire (PANA) - The International Labour Office (ILO) Wednesday presented a digest of practical guidelines on HIV/AIDS for workers, at a sub regional workshop in Abidjan. The 50-page document on HIV/AIDS within the labour world, highlights prevention, managing and alleviating the impact of HIV/AIDS on l
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - Large numbers of state employees are dying of AIDS in Mozambique, Prime Minister Pascoal Mocumbi said in Maputo Thursday. Addressing a press briefing, Mocumbi, who is a medical doctor by profession, said that reliable statistics on AIDS-related deaths were not available because of under-repo
Brazzaville, Congo (PANA) - An estimated HIV prevalence of 14 percent prevails in the southern Congolese port city of Pointe- Noire compared with about 8 percent in Brazzaville, the capital official sources said Thursday. The situation of the disease is still disturbing in Pointe- Noire , said a health official, two da
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - British Airways, through the United Nations Children s Education Fund (UNICEF), has collected over Ksh 55.5 million (about 0.7 million US dollars) for the care of people living with HIV/Aids in Kenya. British Airways country commercial manager, Ian Petrie, told journalists in Nairobi Thursday th
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - Botswana s President Festus Mogae is scheduled to commission a sophisticated AIDS research and testing laboratory in Gaborone Saturday as part of activities marking World AIDS Day. Besides AIDS research, the pula 15.5 million laboratory located within the Princess Marina General hospital in
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - A Ghanaian newspaper has appealed to the National AIDS Commission and NGOs to step up their AIDS education campaign by focusing on the youth. It said they should drive home to the youth, especially students, that being the future of the nation, they must embrace the message and adhere to every wa
Johannesburg, South Africa (PANA) - More than 7000 HIV/AIDS volunteers have planned a door-to-door campaign in South Africa s Gauteng province to mark World AIDS Day on 1 December. Organisers say the volunteers will deal with discrimination against HIV/AIDS sufferers, attempt to deepen understanding of issues related t
Bujumbura, Burundi (PANA) - The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Burundi has indicated plans to take the sensitisation campaign on HIV/AIDS to prisoners in the country, on the occasion of World HIV/AIDS Day coming up 1 December. A press release said activities were planned for the central prison in Mp
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Malaria, Africa s biggest killer disease, is also one of its biggest impediments in the continent s progress. With 90 percent of the global malaria deaths occurring in Africa, a vaccine - still elusive up now - may be the only solution to the problem. According to Population Services Internatio
Douala, Cameroon (PANA) - Health authorities in Cameroon estimate that some 600 people are infected by the AIDS virus each day. According to a survey conducted by the Health ministry 15 years after a national HIV/AIDS control committee was set up, the 15- 29 age group accounts for 30 percent of the infected population.
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Eight in 10 South Africans are concerned about contracting HIV/AIDS or another sexually transmitted infection, but many are not protecting themselves, a major international sex survey revealed. The 2001 Durex Global sex Survey, carried out in 28 countries worldwide, found almost a fifth
Douala, Cameroon (PANA) - Raphaël Salambere, director of civil aviation in Burkina Faso , has requesting Cameroon Airlines (Camair) to start flights to Ouagadougou before 9 December, when the international conference on AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases is scheduled to open there. According to a Burkinabe dele
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire (PANA) - Managing directors, heads of human resource units, company doctors and representatives of water and electricity companies from six French-speaking countries in West Africa Wednesday ended a two-day an HIV/AIDS sensitisation workshop in Abidjan. Organisers said the workshop aimed at
Yaounde, Cameroon (PANA) - A third of Cameroon s young people have been infected with HIV and were likely to succumb to the fatal stage of AIDS soon, the national AIDS control committee has reported. Latest findings by the committee show that 33 percent of the population aged between 15 and 29 years are HIV-positive.
New York, US (PANA) - The World Bank has appointed Ethiopian medical scientist, Debrework Zewdie, its Adviser on HIV/AIDS. The Bank said Tuesday that Zewdie would be responsible for intensifying its field work and represent the Bank in the global movement of governments, communities, private companies, development agen
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - The Kenyan branch of the Association of African Women for Research and Development (AAWORD) will this week host a major national conference on the HIV/AIDS scourge and its impact on Kenyan families. The conference, aimed at taking stock of achievements and losses made in the fight against the pa
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Voluntary testing for HIV/AIDS is gaining acceptance among Kenyan youth intending to marry, say officials at the country s Centre for Disease Control (CDC). The officials say at least 20 people go for voluntary counselling and testing daily in centres recently established under the CDC, a Kenyan
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - A Botswana Member of Parliament was Tuesday thrown out of the house for claiming that he can cure AIDS patients. Gaborone North MP Michael Mzwinila incurred the wrath of speaker Ray Mlomo when he said that traditional healers who are members of a sect he leads known as Guta Rwa Mwari can cur
Brazzaville, Congo (Congo) - A census is underway in Congo to find AIDS orphans below the age of 18, official sources said in Brazzaville Monday. The census, conducted by an NGO, Medecins d Afrique (doctors of Africa) has so far identified nearly 5,000 of such AIDS orphans in the Congolese capital alone. Since October,
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - President Blaise Compaore Monday launched a National Council for the fight against HIV/AIDS and other Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs), in Burkina Faso. Formerly the National Committee to fight HIV/AIDS under the Health Ministry, the Council is to be co-ordinated by the presiden
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - The first session of Burkina Faso s National Council for the Fight Against AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Diseases (CNLS-STD) has pleaded for more openness in financing AIDS/STD activities. At the end of a meeting chaired by President Blaise Compaore, participants recommended, among ot
Brazzaville, Congo (PANA) - The tri-therapy treatment of AIDS is expected to cost less than 80 US dollars per patient a month in Congo as opposed to the current monthly bills of 800 dollars per sufferer. The fall in prices is a consequence of the country s support for the speeding-up of access to medical care for AIDS
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire (PANA) - Ivorian first lady, Simone Ehivet Gbagbo and a number of industry chief executives have signed an AIDS covenant to boost the fight against the disease in the country. Officials said the Together against AIDS pact prescribes joint actions and the harmonisation of strategies at the nation
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Distance learning through the use of information and communication technology (ICT) could reduce the spread of HIV/AIDS among the youth in Africa, experts say. In a paper, The Response of Information Technology to the Challenge of HIV/AIDS in Higher Education Institutions in Africa, a UNESCO ed
Yaounde, Cameroon (PANA) - Former African football celebrity Roger Milla has been appointed UNAIDS Ambassador, the State Radio in Cameroon reported at the weekend. The new plenipotentiary is due this week at the UNAIDS headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland to receive the honour.
Brazzaville, Congo (PANA) - Congo Brazzaville government plans to make anti-retroviral drugs available in 2002 for the treatment of HIV/AIDS in the country, Health Minister Leon Alfred Opimbat has said. The project is to be facilitated through ongoing negotiations involving UNAIDS , UNICEF, WHO, the UN Population Fu
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - The International Development Association, the World Bank s soft loan arm, has loaned Ghana 25 million US dollars for its fight against AIDS, Ghana Television reported Sunday. The money will be used for Ghana s 27.8-million-dollar Ghana AIDS Response Project Fund whose aim is to support efforts to
Kinshasa, DR Congo (PANA) - Some two million condoms are used monthly in Kinshasa, comprising six million inhabitants, a local anti-AIDS NGO reported Friday. Family Health Association or ASF is an NGO in charge of awareness for HIV/AIDS prevention and supervises the sale and distribution of condoms. Condoms sell like
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - The first edition of the Volunteer s Trophy volleyball tournament to raise awareness against AIDS in Cotonou and its suburb runs 24 November-1 December in Cotonou. Initiated by the NGO, Abeilles Volontaire du Progres-Afrique (AVP-Afrique) in cooperation with the Atlantique District Volleyball Le
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire (PANA) - Senior executives from water and electricity companies are to discuss the impact of HIV/AIDS in six Francophone West African countries during a two-day workshop opening in Abidjan Monday, the organisers said Friday. The theme of the meeting, organised by
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Addiction to illicit drugs has fuelled HIV infections in Kenya, the National Agency for the Campaign against Drug Abuse has reported. The agency s national coordinator, Joseph Kaguthi said Friday that nearly three million Kenyans, many of them secondary school pupils, were hooked to illicit drug
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - Putting men in the front line to fight HIV/AIDS would be the surest way to contain the pandemic in Africa, the OAU said Friday. In a statement on this year s World AIDS Day, the OAU said men are a key determinant of success in the struggle against HIV/AIDS. Since men s behaviour affec
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - Five African delegations are among activists who stormed the Global AIDS Fund s board meeting in Brussels Thursday demanding that the fund should subsidise cheap AIDS drugs, a Health GAP Coalition communiqué has said. Saying bureaucrats betray people with AIDS in poor countries, NGOs from
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Human Rights Watch has urged South African President Thabo Mbeki to have his government drop its fight against a legal appeal for low-cost HIV/AIDS treatment for pregnant women. The South African government is currently in court fighting a case brought by the Treatment Action Campaign o
Brazzaville, Congo (PANA) - At least 30 doctors working in 29 private companies and parastatals in Brazzaville are pressing for better management of people living with HIV/AIDS at their workplace, the National AIDS Control Programme revealed Thursday in Brazzaville. It said the doctors made the call at the end of a wor
Harare, Zimbabwe (PANA) - Zimbabwe s weekly Financial Gazette reported Thursday that six of the country s cabinet Ministers had AIDS, and were using anti-retroviral drugs to prolong their lives. The newspaper quoted a medical doctor Frank Guni, as saying the Ministers were among 500 patients receiving anti-retroviral t
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - AIDS has become an outstanding challenge to church leaders in Burkina Faso, according to a pastor involved in the fight against the pandemic in the west African country. Michel Nikiema, executive secretary of L Association Vigilance, has told leaders of Protestant denominations in Bur
Bamako, Mali (PANA) - There are more Malian women infected with the HIV than men, said a study of the Counselling, Care and Assistance Centre (CESAC) released Tuesday in Bamako. Out of 1,324 cases in 2000, the CESAC listed 772 women against 552 men and said that 423 of the women infected are between 25 and 39 years old
Brazzaville, Congo (PANA) - The Congolese government has decided to provide 584 million francs CFA (779 000 US dollars) a year to treat 1,000 HIV/AIDS patients, Health ministry sources said Tuesday in Brazzaville. According to the country s National AIDS Control Programme (NACP), the number of people living with HIV/AI
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - Eighty teachers die annually from HIV/AIDS related ailments in Botswana, authorities in Gaborone said Monday. According to the director of primary education, Sogomotsa Basiamang, 400 teachers will die in the next five years if the trend is not checked. Addressing a conference of primary
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - A new resource centre with accurate and up-to-date information on HIV/AIDS is to be set up in Ethiopia, a country with one of the world s highest prevalence rates, by the John Hopkins University Centre for Communication Programmes (JHU/CCP). The new centre was earmarked following a 300,00
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - Although the number of Mozambicans infected with the HIV, the virus that causes the lethal disease AIDS, has been revised downwards, it has been revealed that the pandemic could still reduce life expectancy in the country by 14 years over the next decade. A technical group from the Natio
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South African banking group Absa on Thursday released an update of its 15-year scenario forecast for the South African economy, this time focusing on the impact of AIDS. Absa s Group Economic Research Unit says that government and business in South Africa have found it difficult to impl
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Using a blend of interventions including folk theatre, Tanzania s national commission on AIDS (TACAIDS) is trying to reach out to the youth in a desperate rearguard battle against HIV/AIDS. Ishi in Kiswahili, the national language or Live in English, is the theme of the multimedia campa
Rabat, Morocco (PANA) - Morocco s health ministry revealed that 913 people living with AIDS, 65 percent of whom were males, had been registered in the kingdom by 30 September 2001. Revealing the statistics in Rabat Thursday, the ministry said that 70 percent of these were aged between 15 and 39 years while 16 percent w
Livingstone, Zambia (PANA) - The UN Development Programme (UNDP) said Monday that 1.6 million Zambians are likely to die from HIV/AIDS in the country by the year 2015. Zambia s UNDP resident representative Olubanke King-Akelere said the prevalence of HIV infection in urban areas is 27 percent, while it stands at 14 per
Lusaka, Zambia (PANA) - A workshop on protecting African sportsmen and sportswomen from contracting HIV opens Wednesday in Nairobi, Kenya . The workshop, dubbed Kick AIDS Out , is intended for sports officials who can raise awareness of AIDS among sportsmen and women. Four Zambian sports officials will be among par
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Countries of the Commonwealth Regional Health Community of East, Central and Southern Africa have mounted a joint strategy to trim the scale of HIV/AIDS by 50 percent in the next four years beginning 2002. The countries also aim at reducing the number of new infections among 15-24 year-
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire (PANA) - The First Lady of Cote d Ivoire, Simone Ehivet Gbagbo has kicked off a national awareness campaign against HIV/AIDS in a move to reawaken consciousness about the pandemic. Dubbed All against AIDS , the campaign is expected to end 13 December. All against AIDS will cover the 58 depa
Kigali, Rwanda (PANA) - Forty-seven Rwandan genocide widows died of AIDS in the year 2000, the Association of Genocide Widows Consolidation, AVEGA (or Agahozo) reported in Kigali Thursday. AVEGA is an umbrella association that caters for the interest of 25,000 widows, who husbands were massacred during the 1994 genocid
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Former Ghanaian President Jerry Rawlings has cast serious doubts over Africa s battle against the killer disease AIDS, lamenting that efforts against the scourge continued to be challenged by limited behavioural change. In an exclusive interview with PANA, Rawlings also said the death t
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Tanzanian Health authorities blame the lack of openness among parents and teachers on HIV/AIDS as one of the factors helping the spread of the scourge in the country. A recent survey conducted by the National AIDS Control Programme (NACP) in some parts of the country showed that youths
Niamey, Niger (PANA) - Niger s National AIDS Control Programme, whose mission is to increase public awareness of the dangers of HIV/AIDS and its causes, recently visited the district of Tahoua (south-west) which is seriously affected by the pandemic due to emigration. The mission aimed at sensitising people in the rura
Niamey, Niger (PANA) - The Luxembourg Agency for Development Co-operation has granted Niger some 2.35 billion CFA francs (about 3.23 million US dollars to help the country in its fight against the spread of HIV/AIDS, State radio reports in Niamey. The grant would support the Niger Information-Education-
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - The International Development Association (IDA) has made a 25-million dollar grant to Benin for the country s anti-HIV/AIDS multi-sectorial project, official sources confirmed in Cotonou Sunday. The project, which is an integral part of the World Bank s HIV/AIDS multi-country programme for Afric
Khartoum, Sudan (PANA) - Sudan s health ministry will soon introduce AIDS tests for all job seekers before they are allowed to join the public service. Announcing the decision over the weekend, the Sudanese minister of health, Ahmed Bilal, said a new law to this effect would be in force at the beginning of 2002. T
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - The government of Tanzania has unveiled a national policy on HIV/AIDS to provide direction for a frantic assault on the disease that has infected an estimated two million people in the country in the past 20 years. The blueprint, intended to induce a united approach against the disease
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - Ethiopian health officials have disclosed that the country s hospitals are crowded with AIDS patients who occupy 42 percent of the beds. The Ministry of Health has prepared guidelines on how we can take care of AIDS patients at home, by families and aid organisations, to reduce the number
Lusaka, Zambia (PANA) - Health Minister Levision Mumba Saturday described HIV/AIDS pandemic as a serious health and developmental problem in Zambia. Addressing the Medical Women s Association of Zambia (MWAZ), Annual General meeting, he said the disease threatened progress in the advancement of women s rights and statu
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Former Ghanaian President Jerry Rawlings Friday asked Zanzibaris to sustain their efforts on the war against AIDS. Speaking separately with the President of the Island, Amani Abedi Karume, religious leaders, NGO representatives and people living with HIV/AIDS, Rawlings said the citizens
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - Ghanaian students Friday urged Parliament to approve a 25 million-US-dollar loan from the World Bank and the British Department for International Development (DFID), to boost the national campaign against HIV/AIDS. The National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS), also called on the government to imple
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - Ghana might in the near future be producing HIV drugs to make it accessible to people infected with the disease, outgoing Health minister Richard Anane intimated on Thursday. The ministry of Health, in conjunction with the World Health Organisation and the Health ministry in
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Growing poverty and rising cases of HIV/AIDS are threatening Kenya s goal of providing education for all by 2015. Latest data from the finance ministry indicate that the economy registered a paltry growth rate of 0.4 percent in 2001, down from an average of 2.4 percent in the 1990s, rendering th
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Former Ghanaian President Jerry Rawlings has added his voice to the growing concern that certain African traditional practices and cultural norms were helping to spread or perpetuate the incurable HIV/AIDS. Rawlings said these practices include wife inheritance and other cultural and be
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - Top Nigerian musicians will perform in Lagos Friday at an AIDS awareness concert being sponsored by Korean electronics company LG. Tagged Rhythms for life , the concert is also aimed at engaging national attention on health-related issues, including family planning. Musicians expected at the
Paris, France (PANA) - UNESCO director general Koichiro Matsuura and the president of the current general conference, Iranian Ahmad Jalali on Wednesday led participants at the session to view the inauguration of a special documentary film on AIDS in Africa. Iranian cinema director Abbas Kiarostami shot the film entitle
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Former Ghanaian President Jerry Rawlings arrives in Tanzania Thursday on a mission aimed at promoting the volunteering spirit in the fight against HIV/AIDS. As a UN Volunteers Eminent Person, Rawlings is scheduled to meet Tanzanian government authorities, heads of UN agencies and non-go
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - President Festus Mogae said Monday that Botswana would launch an HIV/AIDS anti-retroviral drug therapy programme before the end of the year. He told parliament the programme would initially target 19,000 patients already admitted in various referral hospitals in Gaborone, Serowe, Francistown
Niamey, Niger (PANA) - The spread of HIV/AIDS in Niger has led to the implementation of a strategic planning process designed as a national response against the pandemic. The minister counsellor at the President s Office in charge of HIV/AIDS, Jules Auguet, said the various stages of planning call for an analysis of th
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - A Kenyan physician has challenged the effectiveness of condoms, charging they are not safe and should not be depended on as preventive measure against HIV/AIDS. The East African Standard daily Monday quoted Dr Steven Karanja of Kenyatta National Hospital as saying condoms have pores that are 50
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - A Ghanaian doctor has warned that by 2014, over 1.2 million people in the country would be infected with the HIV virus if efforts were not doubled to check the infection rate. Dr Phyllis Antwi, a lecturer at the School of Public Health of the University of Ghana, said though the current prevalence
Lusaka, Zambia (PANA) - After four days of talks Zambia and India have agreed to enhance cooperation especially in the field of science and technology, where India is mass producing cheap HIV/AIDS drugs desperately needed by Zambian patients. A communiqu‚ issued Friday at the end of the talks in Lusaka said cooperatio
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Tanzania s media women have teamed up with a host of local and foreign NGOs to halt the spread of HIV/AIDS in the country. The Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) Wednesday launched a three-year (2001-2003) Advocacy against Gender Violence and HIV/AIDS programme to supplement gove
Johannesburg, South Africa (PANA) - President Thabo Mbeki rebuffed opposition parliamentarians over allegations that the South African government was in denial of the seriousness of the spread of HIV/AIDS. Mbeki, who had just returned from Nigeria , where he was attended a summit of African leaders on the New Africa
Abuja, Nigeria (PANA) - Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo Monday lauded the country s vanguard role in raising world-wide awareness in the fight against HIV/AIDS, as Nigerian workers staged a multi-sectoral walk/rally to boost the campaign among the population. Obasanjo told the rally at the Eagle Square in Abuja th
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - Ghana s Minister of Women and Children s Affairs on Monday appealed to non-governmental and civil society organisations engaged in the fight against HIV/AIDS to involve men in their programmes. Gladys Asmah, speaking at a workshop organised by Ghana AIDS Response Fund (GARFUND) said men appeared t
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa s Partnership Against AIDS has marked its third year with a call by Deputy President Jacob Zuma for concerted action at stemming new HIV infections and providing care and support to the infected. Launched in 1998, Partnership Against AIDS is part of government s multi-strat
Paris, France (PANA) - The President of the South African Nkosi AIDS Association, Gail Johnson said extreme poverty was a major bottleneck in efforts to contain HIV/AIDS in South Africa where 1700-1900 new HIV positive cases were recorded daily. Johnson made the remarks at a press conference over the weekend during a g
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - Top African musicians would on 8 December stage a concert in Ouagadougou, the proceeds of which would be used to in the fight against HIV/AIDS, sources said. According to organising committee member Christophe Ouedraogo, the proceeds would also be used to prepare for the 12th Internat
Niamey, Niger (PANA) - Muslim leaders in Niger have asked the authorities to encourage premarital AIDS tests and to take strong measures for the observance of moral values. The religious leaders made the call at a workshop held to validate a sensitisation guide on HIV. The meeting, organised by the National AIDS Contro
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - A Kenyan herbalists association has suspended 20 of its members for misconduct through unethical practices. The 20, all from Nyanza province, had claimed that they could cure the dreaded HIV/AIDS, which is killing hundreds of Kenyans daily, the association said. Nyanza Provincial Chairman of
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - The US Agency for International Development has earmarked 8.8 million US dollars to finance programmes aimed to halt the spread of HIV/AIDS in five regions of Tanzania. The money will be channeled through NGOs and Community-based Organisations (CBOs) in the regions of Shinyanga, Tabora,
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Anglican Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane is consulting governments in southern Africa, the ecumenical movement, organised labour and NGOs about declaring the HIV/AIDS situation a state of emergency. In a statement released on Thursday, Ndungane the church s recent synod of bishops charg
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - NMG-LEVY, one the leading business service companies focused on private sector HIV/AIDS management initiatives, Thursday called on government to urgently channel resources to meet the HIV/AIDS challenge to the South African economy rather than become side-tracked by statistical sniping
Bujumbura, Burundi (PANA) - The British NGO, Action Aid, is to grant 6 million dollars to the government of Burundi to finance several HIV/AIDS control projects in the next four years, official sources said Thursday in Bujumbura. Briefing reporters at an information workshop on the fight against HIV/AIDS, Action Aid di
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Tanzania government s decision to establish a national policy on HIV/AIDS this week won support among the country s prominent newspapers, which said it was long overdue. Last Sunday President Benjamin Mkapa hinted that government was formulating a comprehensive national HIV/AIDS policy,
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - The 42-year-old son of a prominent Kenyan hotelier has gone to court accusing members of his family of disowning him because he has contracted the HIV virus. In an affidavit filed in the high court, Michael Ryan Kungu claims that his father, a leading hotelier in Nakuru town, has chased him from
Opuwo, Namibia (PANA) - Namibia Red Cross Society has completed a study on public perceptions of reproductive health and sexually transmitted infections for developing educational tools to address the HIV/AIDS pandemic. The Namibian news agency, NAMPA, has reported that the survey, conducted in Kunene North region, foc
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia , (PANA) - The Ethiopian government has allocated 70 million US dollars to fight AIDS, Dagnachew Hailemariam, Head of the National Anti-AIDS Council Secretariat, said Wednesday. Hailemariam said the money came mainly from donors and the Ethiopian government. The key issue in fighting AIDS is
Harare, Zimbabwe (PANA) - A Zimbabwean health official said Tuesday that HIV infection continued to rise unabated in the country, with four children being born with the incurable disease every hour. We know that a third of pregnant women in Zimbabwe are infected, although the majority of them are not aware of their con
Niamey, Niger (PANA) - African francophone MPs, belonging to a Parliamentary Network for the fight against HIV/AIDS, have agreed at a meeting in Niamey, Niger, to mobilise efforts in their respective countries for the intensification of the campaign against the pandemic. The MPs met in Niamey last week to officially la
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Health authorities in Tanzania have identified gender inequality and creeping poverty as prime causes for the high rate of HIV/AIDS cases among women in the country. Recent studies by World Vision Tanzania in both urban and rural areas indicate that many women have been involved in unsa
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - A Kenyan NGO, Programme for the Appropriate Technology in Health (PATH), has launched a radio talk shop dubbed Ni Nini Kati Yetu (Kiswahili for what is in our midst ) in furtherance of the campaign against HIV/AIDS. The programme sponsored by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) t
Blantyre, Malawi (PANA) - Malawian doctors are ignoring a generous offer for specialist medical training in the Republic of China because they do not accept mandatory screening for HIV/AIDS. The Taiwanese government, as part of its development assistance to Malawi, has since 1999 offered at least 10 scholarships to Mal
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - In Burkina Faso , 3,500 children orphaned by AIDS began school this week, thanks to a pilot project supported by the National HIV/AIDS Commission, UNDP and several donors. A UNDP report says the project is assisting children from 40 local associations in 17 provinces around the country.
Niamey, Niger (PANA) - African Francophone MPs, comprising the parliamentary network for HIV/AIDS control, have expressed commitment to mobilise national efforts against HIV/AIDS. They made the declaration Thursday in Niamey at the launch of that parliamentary network which defined a concise programme that will enable
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Social Development minister Zola Skweyiya has commended the growing number of artists and musicians who are promoting the fight in South Africa against HIV/AIDS. Skweyiya, who was commenting ahead of an HIV Social Fund concert billed for 27 October in Secunda, enjoined artists and music
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo has sent to the National Assembly (Parliament), a bill seeking to establish a National Agency for the Prevention and Control of AIDS (NAPCA) in the country. Obasanjo, who has made the fight against HIV/AIDS a priority of his administration since assuming offi
Blantyre, Malawi (PANA) - A 60-year-old Malawian grandmother has been sentenced to seven years imprisonment with hard labour after beings found guilty of infecting an 11-year-old boy with HIV, the virus that can lead to the incurable AIDS. However, the woman identified as Emmie Mkumbira appeared unconcerned as the Chie
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - The United States Agency for International Development is to grant 11.5 million US dollars for a programme aimed at curbing the further spread of HIV/AIDS in the Maputo Corridor. The programme is to be undertaken by a prominent Mozambican NGO, the Community Development Foundation (FDC), the
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Over 1 000 people in Cape Town have demonstrated calling on the government to implement a countrywide HIV mother-to-child transmission Prevention (MTCTP) programme and develop a National Treatment and Prevention Plan to combat HIV/AIDS. A service at St George s Cathedral was on Monday c
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - Development partners including the UNDP, have donated some 47.1 million CFA francs towards the education of 3,500 AIDS orphans in Burkina Faso. (750 CFA francs=1USD). The UNDP contributed 15 millions CFA francs under the programme called Education for AIDS Orphans, while the French E
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - Prices for HIV/AIDS drugs looked set to become more affordable in South Africa with the announcement at the weekend of two initiatives aimed at cutting the cost of the most frequently prescribed anti-retrovirals. Multinational pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - The NGO Population Services International (PSI), said Saturday it had distributed some 33 million condoms in Benin from 1990. The NGO, which is specialised in health marketing, said the major beneficiaries of the protective shield against HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases, were us
Harare, Zimbabwe (PANA) - The UN Food an Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has in a report released Saturday said that AIDS had reduced food production in Zimbabwe by as much as 50 percent in the last five years, warning that the situation would get worse in coming years. The FAO said the slump in food production was caus
Bujumbura, Burundi (PANA) - More than 100 soldiers from several units of Burundi s Army are currently participating in an AIDS awareness seminar, south of the country. Organisers say soldiers belong to a vulnerable social group due to the nature of their job. Youngsters who join the Army every year are always eager to
Windhoek, Namibia (PANA) - When former basketball wizard Magic Johnson went public in 1992 that he had been diagnosed HIV positive, the whole of America and the world basketball fraternity went frozen in disbelief. Then another black American pelted in a similar breath taking news, this time, it was the former world te
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Famous South African gospel singer Rebecca Malope is in Tanzania to drum up support for the country s anti-AIDS campaign. Malope is touring Tanzania at the invitation of a non- governmental organisation, Christian Business Women Foundation Trust Fund, to raise money for HIV/AIDS victims
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa s Social Development Minister, Zola Skweyiya, on Thursday commended the community of Masoyi in Mpumalanga for assisting children, particularly orphans whose parents have died of HIV/AIDS. Skweyiya urged other communities across the country to follow their example. According
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - The HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control Council in Ethiopia s Harari state is to disburse a total of 18.000 US dollars to 36 grassroots committees fighting the pandemic, council sources said. Council secretary Mehadi Zekaria affirmed Wednesday that six committees had so far received 500 dolla
Lusaka, Zambia (PANA) - Zambia has officially queried the Joint UN programme on HIV/AIDS for its prolonged delay in testing the efficacy of a drug discovered by a Chinese doctor. Official sources in Lusaka said that the Ministry of Health has sent a letter to UNAIDS headquarters in Geneva,
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - Ghanaian health authorities fear an AIDS explosion could be looming in the country following the growing number of teenagers, as young as 13 years, in the sex trade. The young girls, some of whom are still in basic schools, and citing several reasons including economic difficulties for their decis
Brazzaville, Congo (PANA) - The World Food Programme has launched a feeding project devoted to HIV/AIDS patients in Congo, sources close to the National AIDS Eradication Programme disclosed Wednesday. Some 45,000 persons living with AIDS in the country would benefit from the project up to August 2004. To fully benefit
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - For the first time since 1984 when AIDS was detected in Kenya, health authorities in the east African country reported Wednesday that the pandemic has stabilised. Two senior officials have attributed the stabilisation to the use of condoms. Director of Medical Services Richard Muga told PANA tha
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - Burkina Faso and the International Development Agency (IDA) have signed a loan agreement worth 16.4 billion FCFA francs (22, 620,690 US dollars) to support the National Aids Control Programme Sexually Transmitted Infections. Health Ministry sources in Ouagadougou said that the amount
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - The president of the African Union against Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) has expressed confidence that the AIDS epidemic in Africa would be reversed by 2006. Dr Ibra Ndoye, speaking at the opening of an International Steering Committee (ISC) of the 12th Conference on AIDS and
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - The battle against HIV/AIDS in Tanzania this week took a new turn with the church spearheading a national campaign to make it obligatory for couples to undergo blood screening before marriage. The new approach, intended to halt the fast spreading of the incurable disease, has won suppor
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Former Ghanaian President Jerry John Rawlings took Africa s fight against HIV/AIDS one step further in Nairobi Thursday, pulling out a pack of condoms from his jacket to demonstrate that prevention is better than cure in the anti-AIDS crusade. The pandemic has claimed millions of lives on the co
Brazzaville, Congo (PANA) - An NGO called Médecin d Afrique or doctors of Africa has created a project to cater for the wellbeing of AIDS orphans in Congo, health officials said in Brazzaville Wednesday. According to these sources, its objective is to ensure the orphans have access to basic services and favourable cond
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - A study on the influence of cultural practices on behaviour and HIV/AIDS transmission will be undertaken soon in Botswana under a joint project of UNESCO and UNAIDS . A group of consultants will carry out the study in the southern African country said to have the world s highest infection ra
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - Marginalization of HIV/AIDS sufferers would open the way for a culture of silence around the disease and enhance its spread in Ethiopia, the UN Children s Fund has warned. Consequently, the disease is likely to take an enormous toll on human life in all sectors of society in the years to
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya s HIV/AIDS infection rate has gone down, thanks to the widespread condom use in the country. According to Medical Services Director Richard Muga, HIV/AIDS prevalence has stabilised and stood at between 13 and 14 percent due to condom use and government interventions. The active interv
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has briefed Ghanaian former President Jerry Rawlings on Ethiopia s efforts at combating the spread of HIV/AIDS, the State radio reported in Addis Ababa Tuesday. Rawlings, who is on a three-day visit as UN s Eminent Person on Volunteerism, has been adv
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - Former Ghanaian President Jerry Rawlings is in Addis Ababa as a UN Volunteers Eminent Person to advocate on the role of volunteers in the fight against HIV/AIDS. Rawlings, who will be in Ethiopia for three days, is accompanied by Alamz Gebru, chief of the African section and co-ordinator
Tripoli, Libya (PANA) - Ruling in a case involving six Bulgarians (a doctor and five nurses) accused of contaminating over 400 Libyan children with HIV/AIDS at Benghazi hospital, 1,050 km east of Tripoli, was Saturday adjourned to 22 December. To everyone s surprise, the Peoples Court, which was expected to issue a ru
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - A new report by the World Bank has warned that universities in Africa may be a hotbed for the transmission of HIV. The report, titled Challenging the challenger: Understanding and expanding the response of universities in Africa to HIV/AIDS pins down the entailing scenario on lax admini
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - The Mozambican Education Ministry estimates that about 19,200 teachers and more than 100 senior education officials will die of the lethal disease AIDS, or of AIDS-related causes, between the years 2000 and 2010. Ministry documents say that 23.3 percent of these deaths will occur in the cent
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - Demonstrating the importance he attaches to the fight against the spread of AIDS in Burkina Faso, President Blaise Campaore has taken over the charge of the National Council on AIDS and Control of Sexually Transmitted Infections. A statement issued after Thursday s session of the cabi
Brazzaville, Congo (PANA) - Congo s education ministry has launched an AIDS prevention project in schools, whose objective is to mobilise the entire academic system against the pandemic, informed sources said in Brazzaville Friday. According to sources close to the ministry of health, teachers will be trained in method
Johannesburg, South Africa (PANA) - Anglican Arch Bishop Njongonkulu Ndugane has called on the South African government to declare HIV/AIDS a national emergency. The bishop also added his voice to growing calls for government to accept the Medical Research Council s (MRC) report on the pandemic. Weekend papers publ
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - Two Benin HIV-positive patients, Denis d Oliveira and Francois Dubal Kodo, plan a three-month campaign from October to raise public awareness on HIV/AIDS. The campaign will target mainly young school dropouts, in the outskirts of Cotonou and the suburbs of Godomey and Abomey-Calavi, according to
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - Ethiopia s education ministry has earmarked two million US dollars to be used in a project to prevent the further spread of HIV/AIDS in schools. The secretary of the ministry s AIDS prevention and control task force, Kassu Abdi, told a workshop in Addis Ababa Wednesday that the funds were
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - The World Trade Organisation s ministerial conference, to be held 9-13 November in Doha, Qatar , will have to take a position on access to drugs for people in developing countries, according to Jamie Love s pharm policy wire. It reports that African governments are asking for a moratorium on
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - The HIV/AIDS Control Committee of Kenya s northern District of Turkana has blamed long-distance truck drivers for spreading the disease in the area through their indiscriminate sexual behaviour. Consequently, the Turkana Central Constituency AIDS control Committee (CACC) has appealed to the poli
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - A Benin NGO, Stop AIDS, has started an AIDS campaign focusing on changing the people s attitude towards the disease. Stop AIDS manager Ignace Toha said at the heart of the campaign is information targeting the people s sexual behaviour through civic education. One of the key issues of the ca
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Tanzania on Thursday appealed to other African nations to consider applying correct technology in solving the continent s problems. The call was made by the country s science, technology and higher education minister, Pius Ng wandu, in a speech to mark the African Intellectual Property
Bujumbura, Burundi (PANA) - The prevalence of HIV/AIDS in rural Burundi has risen from 6 percent ten years ago to about 14 percent today compared with around 20 percent in urban centres, health authorities reported Wednesday. The officials revealed these figures during the opening of a six-day workshop in Gitega, the c
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - The Swedish government has donated vehicles worth about 250,000 US dollars to the Kenyan Health Ministry in support of the anti-HIV/AIDS crusade in the country. The 17 vehicles are to be distributed to Districts hardest hit by the disease and areas with rough terrain in the country. Taking d
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya s National AIDS Control Council (NACC) expects to reduce the HIV\AIDS prevalence rate in the country by about 30 percent among young people in the next five years through a national control programme. The council, however, needs around 14,000 million Kenyan shillings (about 177 million US
Paris, France (PANA) - A new report jointly released by the PANOS Institute of London and UNAIDS has warned of the devastating spread of HIV/AIDS in the long term if young men, who account for a quarter of people living with HIV, were not targeted in the struggle against the scourge. The report entitled Young Men
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Sub-Saharan African countries, including Kenya, are facing security threats from the increasing number of HIV/AIDS cases, the National AIDS Control Council (NACC) said in Nairobi Friday. NACC Director, Margaret Gachara said in a statement that Defence Ministries in the region had reported preval
Harare, Zimbabwe (PANA) - Zimbabwean boxing suffered a major blow Thursday after one of the country s top pugilists tested positive for HIV, which automatically ended his international career. Boxing promoter Stalin Mau Mau said national welterweight champion John Konde was now forbidden from fighting in many countries
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - State House sources in Tanzania have linked senior health and defence ministry officials to an AIDS drug scam that culminated in the expulsion of two South African nationals Wednesday. Jacques Siegrried Zigi Visser and Khamalo Themba Bafana entered the country to conduct anti-AIDS clini
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - Norway and UNICEF on Wednesday signed a 1.6 million US dollar agreement to be used in building the capacity of Ethiopia s National and Regional AIDS Council secretariats. The agreement comes in response to the rapid spread of HIV/AIDS in Ethiopia, where an estimated three million people a
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - The Executive Director of the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS, Dr. Peter Piot, has denounced the lack of access to life-saving treatment by a majority of people living with HIV in the developing world. The fact that today the overwhelming majority of people with HIV in the developing world do not
Kigali, Rwanda (PANA) - Rwandan President Paul Kagame has left Kigali for the United States where he is scheduled Wednesday to address an international conference on AIDS vaccine, the President s Office announced Tuesday. The AIDS Vaccine 2001 Conference, being held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is attended by over 1,
Kigali, Rwanda (PANA) - Rwandan President, Paul Kagame, Wednesday invited world s leading HIV/AIDS vaccine researchers to Kigali to explore possibilities of undertaking vaccine trials in his country, official sources reported Thursday. Kagame made the invitation the opening of the first ever AIDS Vaccine Conference in
Kinshasa, DR Congo (PANA) - United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan has appealed for equal access to HIV/AIDS drugs for people who have the means to pay for treatment and the poor in a bid to curb the incurable disease. Annan made this appeal on Sunday when he and his wife visited people living with HIV/AIDS at the
Bujumbura, Burundi (PANA) - Burundi has finalised its five-year plan to combat HIV/AIDS, which requires at least 220 million US dollars, an official source said in Bujumbura Friday. According to the director of the National Programme for the control of AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Diseases, Dr. Joseph Wakana, the fund
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - A yearlong programme to control sexually-transmitted diseases has been launched in Benin s transport sector with support from the World Bank. The project, launched in Cotonou Thursday by the Executive director of the Benin Development Association, Christian Martins, seeks to train peer educators
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - A medical expert has cautioned persons living with HIV/AIDS in Ethiopia against reverting to risky behaviour after getting anti-retroviral drugs. Dagnachew Haile-Mariam of Ethiopia s National AIDS Council said the anti-retrovirals were meant for reducing the viral load in the body and not
Conakry, Guinea (PANA) - The Guinean national Women s Day, celebrated 27 August, is focusing this year on the fight against AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. AIDS is more a social rather than a medical problem, the main victims of which are women and youths, declared Marie Toure, Assistant National Director
Lome, Togo (PANA) - The Japanese government has granted 427,350 dollars to Togo in support that country s fight against HIV/AIDS. Sources in the capital, Lome said the grant would finance the preparation of an emergency HIV/AIDS eradication plan. The project targets several objectives, including a reduction of the HIV
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - The current scale of crime and AIDS and the reassuring propensity of some African leaders to steer the continent to a better tomorrow are the issues that appear of long-term import to the Tanzanian media this week. Crime, certain sections of the media lamented, was spiralling, while AID
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Rising crime and cases of AIDS as well as initiatives by some African leaders to steer the continent to a better future were the main issues discussed by the Tanzanian media this week. Certain sections of the media lamented that crime was spiralling while others noted that AIDS appeared
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - The Nigerian government is to receive a 204.59 million-dollar loan from the International Development Agency (IDA) to boost ongoing privatisation of inefficient public enterprises and the fight against HIV/AIDS in the country. Transport Minister Ojo Maduekwe told journalists in Abuja Wednesday t
Kampala, Mozambique (PANA) - Mozambican parliament deputies visiting Uganda said they were impressed by the manner in which Ugandans have openly dealt with issues of sexuality, condom use and the HIV/AIDS epidemic in their efforts to stop the disease. They added that in Mozambique these issues were still taboo for
Lusaka, Zambia (PANA) - Zambia s average life expectancy at birth has drastically fallen from 43 years in 1996 to 37 today due to high incidences of diseases, particularly the incurable HIV/AIDS, it was learned in Lusaka Wednesday. The country s population is under pressure from communicable diseases such as
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - Some 78 out of 167 people who underwent blood tests in Debre Marcos hospital in East Gojjam Zone of Ethiopia s Amahara State were found HIV positive, health authorities said Sunday. At a sensitisation meeting, the they said the majority of those found infected with virus were females.
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya s Vice President George Saitoti Saturday said the AIDS pandemic was reversing the country development as the total prevalence HIV rate hit the 13.5 percent mark. Speaking in Nairobi during an award ceremony for winners of this year s annual music and cultural festival, Saitoti urged Kenyan
Port Louis, Mauritius (PANA) - Mauritius Friday launched a National HIV/AIDS Strategic Plan 2001/2005, designed to prevent new infections and step up care for patients. Unveiling the Plan, Deputy Premier Paul Berenger said drastic measures were needed to prevent a major catastrophe. He said the government would now
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - The Jackson Five, the popular US group that gave the world megastar Michael Jackson, will soon reunite to stage a concert whose proceeds will go towards benefiting AIDS and other natural orphans in Africa. Making the announcement, Jermaine Jackson, who spent some time in Nairobi last week, said
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Former Mozambican First Lady Graca Machel has urged the Anglican Church to use its strengths to mobilise people in the war against HIV/AIDS. She spoke Wednesday to delegates and partners at the All Africa Anglican AIDS Conference in Boksburg, South Africa. The conference is an initi
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya has launched a national HIV/AIDS hotline to provide information on the pandemic to anyone requiring urgent assistance and guidance. The hotline, inaugurated Wednesday by the Kenya AIDS Watch Institute (KAWI) will start operations on 1 September and will be manned 12 hours daily, including
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - The scourge of AIDS is threatening to erode Tanzania s achievements in child health as an increasing number of children are getting infected by their mothers living with HIV, which causes the incurable disease. Tanzania had attained enviable progress in its child healthcare programmes b
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Deputy President Jacob Zuma on Monday lamented that the stigma attached to AIDS had resulted in horrific forms of discrimination and violence including rejection, ridicule and death, for HIV infected individuals and people with AIDS related aliments. He told the All-Africa Anglican
Port Louis, Mauritius (PANA) - A youth group, Mauritius Youth for Life, would this week launch a campaign to sensitise students on HIV/AIDS. We support life, health and the protection of life as well as use of the condom, one of the group s leaders explained, as she presented a document on HIV/AIDS compiled for distrib
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - Ethiopia has started importing duty-free life-prolonging drugs for AIDS sufferers, President Negaso Gidada announced Sunday. Referring to a recent demonstration by HIV-infected Ethiopians to demand life-prolonging drugs, Gidada, also chairman of the National Anti-Aids Council, said he sup
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - Ethiopia s Drug Administration and Control Authority said some 24 billion birr (about 2.8 million US dollars) would be needed every year to import life-prolonging drugs for the 400,000 HIV/AIDS patients in the country. Bekle Tefere, Drug Evaluation and Registration team leader with the Au
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - Lagos State, with one of Nigeria s highest HIV prevalence rates, Saturday begins massive HIV/AIDS prevention rallies in all its 20 local governments. The Lagos State AIDS Control Agency said Friday that it was jointly sponsoring the 20-day rallies with several non-governmental organisations invo
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - There was mild drama at Nairobi s Kenyatta National Hospital Thursday when journalists from various media houses in the Kenyan capital declined to undergo free tests for the incurable HIV/AIDS. The local media on Friday reported the journalists turned down the offer from public health minister,
Mbabane, Swaziland (PANA)- Swaziland s ministry of education intends to modify the school curriculum to address HIV/AIDS, The Swazi Observer quoted education minister John Carmachael as saying this week. Speaking at the official opening of Macmillan Boleswa Publishers, Southern Africa Distribution Centre, in Matsapha,
Bamako, Mali (PANA) - Malian health minister Dr Traore Fatoumata Nafo launched Tuesday in Bamako an operation aimed at preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS among truck drivers plying along inter-state roads in West Africa. The operation whose slogan is drive under protection was initiated by an NGO, Population Services In
Brazzaville, Congo (PANA) - A national network has been set up in Congo to coordinate action in the fight against HIV/AIDS. The organ was created last week in Brazzaville at an NGO forum on the pandemic. Participants at the forum suggested that NGOs train in prevention counselling techniques. They recommended the invol
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - Participants at a panel discussion organised by the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) and the Senegalese government sounded positive Monday about prospects in the fight against HIV/AIDS. The panel that was composed of Senegal s Youth, Environment and Public Hygiene minister Modou Diagne Fada and three
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa s Western Cape Health Department Monday called for all children, even if they be HIV positive, to be immunised against major vaccine-preventable diseases. Immunisation remains the cornerstone of child health and no child should be denied the benefit of it, read the core me
Windhoek, Namibia , (PANA) - The HIV/AIDS pandemic could wipe out the entire Namibian society unless urgent preventative measures are taken, a government minister warned in Windhoek Sunday. HIV/AIDS has become the principal public health problem in Namibia with current statistics revealing that one in every four Namibi
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - Mozambican Youth Minister Joel Libombo Sunday called on the youth in the country to join forces in the fight against sexually transmitted diseases, especially HIV/AIDS. Speaking in Maputo at the opening of the Youth Week, leading up to the celebration of the International Youth Day 12 August
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - Nigeria s President Olusegun Obasanjo has directed the nation s military authorities to provide free condoms for soldiers to protect them from contacting HIV/AIDS. In addition, the President said all soldiers must be educated on the dangers of illicit and unprotected sex and particularly abstine
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - In the last ten years more than 10,000 children have been orphaned in Kenya s western district of Rachuonyo after their parents died of AIDS, district sources said. Press accounts quoted Local District Commissioner Catherine Gatama as saying most orphans come from Karachuonyo constituency where
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Two nationals of South Korea are due to appear in court here Monday to answer charges of illegal importation of medicines into Tanzania. Sung Man Cho (65) and his son, Y. K. Cho (32), were arrested on 1 August in Dar es Salaam with 3.
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - More than 10,000 children have been orphaned after their parents died of AIDS in Kenya s western District of Rachuonyo over the last 10 years, the local press reported in Nairobi Friday. The People daily quoted District Commissioner, Catherine Gatama, as saying that most of the orphans were with
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - Benin is to host the Headquarters of the sub-regional programme on fight against spread of HIV/AIDS on the Abidjan-Lagos Corridor, Public Health Minister, Celine Seigon Kandissounon, has announced. Closing a workshop on HIV/AIDS transmission reduction programme in Cotonou Thursday, Kandisounon s
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya s Attorney General, Amos Wako, has warned that it might in the near future be mandatory for couples entering wedlock to undergo HIV/AIDS tests, in order to check the spread of the pandemic. Wako said the authorities were contemplating enforcing the rule very soon, adding that government
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - Ethiopia s Orthodox Church Friday said it would in collaboration with its Sunday Schools, soon launch a nation-wide anti-HIV/AIDS campaign involving 2.5 million youths to raise 30 million US dollars. Church officials said the plan has already been submitted to the national council on HIV/
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - A spokesperson for the African Christian Democratic Party in South Africa has backed the stance of the Catholic Church against the distribution of condoms to young people as a means of checking the spread of HIV/AIDS. According to Cheryllyn Dudley it is glaringly obvious that the war a
Bujumbura, Burundi (PANA) - Some 100 pupils from 10 secondary schools in Bujumbura, Wednesday began a three-day training in the Burundi capital, on AIDS prevention and control. The session was initiated by the Burundi chapter of the Forum of African Educators, to sensitise the pupils on the scope of the HIV/AIDS pandem
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - The Catholic Church in Tanzania has formed a technical team to oversee all HIV/AIDS activities in its 30 dioceses in the country as part of a national response against the rapid spread of the incurable disease. The Technical AIDS Committee, set up by Tanzania Episcopal Conference (TEC),
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Administrators in Kenya s Nyanza province say the rise in HIV/AIDS infection among communities along the Lake Victoria beaches has reached alarming proportions. Nyanza Provincial Commissioner John Nandasaba said half of the population on the Kenyan side of Africa s largest fresh water mass is HI
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - At least 60 delegates are attending a sub-regional workshop in Cotonou, whose aim is to reduce the transmission of HIV/AIDS within the Abidjan- Lagos corridor. Present at the meeting, which opened in Benin s economic capital Monday, are community leaders and co-ordinators, social workers, doctor
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya s Aids Counselling and Support services (TACASS), a Nairobi-based NGO, has urged for new ways to combating HIV/AIDS, after observing that there were no signs the scourge was abating despite the huge sums of money spent to curb its spread. In a statement, TACASS director Wekesa Buteyo regre
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire (PANA) - The West African nations of Nigeria , Ghana , Benin and Cote d Ivoire have decided to join efforts to effectively control AIDS by setting up a health corridor at their respective borders. The Ivorian junior minister in charge of AI
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - The UN Secretary-General s special envoy on HIV/AIDS has hailed Nigeria s efforts at combating the disease, saying such efforts had not been matched by any other African country. I got a measure of optimism that this is a country with determination to curb this pandemic, Stephen Lewis told jour
Lusaka, Zambia (PANA) - The UN HIV/AIDS umbrella body, UNAIDS , is to arrange for the scientific testing of an AIDS cure drug now being tried in Zambia by a Chinese medical doctor. Zambian media quotes UNAIDS resident representative, Kenneth Ofusu-Barko, as saying that arrangements are being made for the testing of the
Windhoek, Namibia (PANA) - Namibian NGO, Catholic AIDS Action, is to host an AIDS conference in the Afrikaans language, the first of its kind in the country. Organisers said Thursday the 31 August to 2 September meeting would bring together people living with HIV/AIDS and offer them an opportunity to share experiences.
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - Ghana has completed clinical tests on HIV/AIDS herbal preparations, Nana Offei Agyen-Tutu III, Head of the Traditional and Alternative Medicines Directorate (TAMD) of Health Ministry, said Thursday. The findings of the research undertaken by the Centre for Scientific Research into Plant Medicine a
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - A Nairobi-based organisation, ATCnet, has launched an Internet database on the African health and HIV/AIDS crisis. ATCnet s aim is to consolidate information about organisations and individuals involved in combating the crisis, which affects more than 25 million people in sub-Saharan Africa.
Paris, France (PANA) - The United Kingdom s Department for International Development (DFID), in consultation with the joint UNAIDS programme on HIV-AIDS, Thursday awarded a contract worth more than 23 million pounds to Action Aid in support of the international partnership against Aids in Africa. Action Aid, a UK-b
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - Sex workers will be among participants of a three-day workshop on planning programmes to reduce HIV/AIDS transmission in the Abidjan-Lagos migration corridor. The workshop, to be held from 30 July to 1 August in Cotonou, is organised by the World Bank, UNAIDS a
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire (PANA) - The rate of HIV prevalence among blood donors in Cote d Ivoire has dropped from 8 percent to 0.3 percent, the National Blood Transfusion Centre (CNTS) revealed Tuesday in Abidjan. According to Ivorian health minister Raymond N dori Abouo, who gave the data at a training workshop for bloo
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire (PANA) - Participants from 20 countries in central and western Africa are Monday attending a regional workshop on mother to child HIV/AIDS transmission in Abidjan, the Ivorian capital. The workshop, organised by UNAIDS , has targeted national focal points in the countries of western and centra
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - A Washington-based pressure group, Constituency for Africa, or CFA has warned against the dangers of turning the proposed Global AIDS Trust Fund into an elitist group that would be answerable to a select few. In a document titled: HIV/AIDS Global Trust Fund: a proposed organisational structure
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - The head of the Traditional and Alternative Medicines Directorate at the Ministry of Health, Nana Offei Agyen-Tutu III, on Friday called for education of traditional healers about HIV/AIDS. He told the Ghana News Agency that the directorate has noticed that most of those healers are ignorant about
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - Humanitarian associations and government have finally begun the HIV/AIDS education of disabled youths, a long-ignored segment of the population and high-profile anti-AIDS campaigns. One such institutions is the US Peace Corps in Ghana, which has started a programme to educate deaf and hearing impa
Praia, Cape Verde (PANA) - Authorities in Cape Verde have created an AIDS control co-ordinating committee headed by Prime minister Jose Maria Neves, official sources said in Praia Friday. The committee s role is to co-ordinate the implementation of government s anti-AIDS policy and promote co-operation with local and i
Kigali, Rwanda (PANA) - The UN Secretary General s Special Envoy on HIV/Aids, Ambassador Stephen Lewis, Friday commended efforts being made by Rwanda to combat the spread of the disease. The UN official had called on Rwandan President Paul Kagame who briefed him about the challenges his country faces in the wake of Aid
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - Fifty women undertook a daylong workshop Thursday to discuss ways through which they could help reduce HIV/AIDS prevalence in the country. Organised by the Benin chapter of African Association of Women Against AIDS and the health ministry, the workshop was held in Akassato, 25 km from Cotonou, o
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - An official of the National AIDS Control Programme (NACP) in Tanzania has expressed optimism over the decline OF HIV/AIDS in some parts of the country. The number of reported HIV/AIDS cases in some regions have drastically decreased, giving hope that the scourge may be under control, NA
Paris, France (PANA) - The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS ( UNAIDS ) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) said they hoped to work together to ease the impact of AIDS on rural poverty and insecure livelihoods through joint efforts in promoting sustainable rural development.
Monrovia, Liberia (PANA) - Liberian President Charles Taylor has called for the provision of affordable anti-AIDS drugs for sufferers of the disease in Liberia. Taylor also wants the establishment of a clinic to cater for sufferers, a statement from the President s office said late Tuesday. Taylor made the appeal w
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Following the decision by national government on the prevention of mother-to-child HIV/AIDS transmission, the Gauteng provincial government has launched two pilot sites. The Natalspruit/JC Dumane site started implementation in May and the Kalafong/Pretoria West site, the following month
Inhambane, Mozambique (PANA) - Mozambican President Joaquim Chissano on Tuesday stressed the need for a careful assessment of the impact of current policies and actions for the struggle against the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Speaking during an extraordinary meeting of the government of the southern province of Inhambane, Chiss
Lusaka, Zambia (PANA) - The HIV/AIDS pandemic is Zambia s main threat to sustaining its human resources, says the 1999-2000 UN Development Programme s Human Development report. According to the report, which was launched in Lusaka Friday, the greatest challenge that Zambia faces is the HIV/AIDS pandemic. The rising m
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Tanzanian boxers would now have to undergo compulsory HIV/AIDS tests before being allowed to participate in the game, the Tanzania Professional Boxing Commission (TPBC) has ruled. From now on boxers would not be allowed to take part in the game inside or outside the country unless they
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Doctors For Life (DFL) is supporting its first day care centre for AIDS orphans in the Etete area of KwaDukuza, north of Durban. The day care centre, which supplies meals and basic care to 35 orphans, is presently housed in a small room, which is completely inadequate. Qinisile Mashoban
Kampala, Uganda (PANA) - Uganda has embarked on a countrywide distribution of anti-retroviral drugs that prolong the lives of people living with HIV/AIDS. These drugs are being administered to patients at five major hospitals within Kampala, the capital, which meet the set medical standards. Officials at the minist
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - A meeting of the Gauteng AIDS Council on Thursday encouraged pregnant women to go for voluntary HIV-testing as a way of preventing the possible transmission of the lethal virus to the unborn babies. The call was made at a meeting held at the Kalafong Hospital in Atteridgeville, Pretoria
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - Botswana s ranking in the UN Human Development assessment has fallen to its lowest position in 16 years due to the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The diamond-rich southern African country with a population of 1.6 million is reputed to have the highest HIV/AIDS prevalence rates in the world with some est
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - Nigeria s federal government Thursday started a two-day training for medical officers selected to administer the anti-retroviral drugs it recently ordered, the News Agency of Nigeria reported. Health workers from federal teaching hospitals and medical centres across the country, are attending th
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya s National AIDS Control Council has attributed the alarming rise in the number of tuberculosis patients to the high HIV/AIDS prevalence in the country. An NACC report issued to PANA Thursday says about 27 percent of tuberculosis (TB) patients at the Kenyatta National Hospital, Kenya s larg
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - The Mozambican government has submitted to the International Labour Organisation (ILO) a project proposal to fight against AIDS in the country s productive sector, according to Labour Minister Mario Sevene. Sevene said that his labour ministry is negotiating the possibility of the ILO financ
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa s Minister of Social Development, Zola Skweyiya on Wednesday launched the first local capacity-building training course for government planners on HIV/AIDS in Mafikeng. Skweyiya urged South Africans to give more attention to children affected or infected by HIV/AIDS as a wa
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - A South African virologist researching on HIV vaccines, Dr Carolyn Williamson, has won a top award at the World Technology Summit in London for her work. Williamson s research is part of the South African AIDS Vaccine Initiative (SAAVI). Dr Williamson s award demonstrates that great str
Lusaka, Zambia (PANA) - A Chinese professor Tuesday told a press conference in Lusaka, Zambia that he had developed and manufactured a new retroviral drug against the HIV/AIDS. Professor Tian Shengxun said that the drug, Tian , is natural, has neither side effects nor toxicity. Its three functions, he revealed, are
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (PANA) - The Ethiopian Orthodox Church would remain committed to supporting the national HIV/AIDS prevention and control measures alongside its apostolic mission, Patriarch Abune Paulos has said. Opening a three-day sensitization workshop on the disease for diocesan heads, Paulos said the Ethiopia
Windhoek, Namibia (PANA) - Namibian Deputy Minister of Defence, Victor Simunja said Monday, that HIV/AIDS is threatening security and military establishments in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region. Speaking at the opening of an HIV/AIDS counsellors training programme, he said that military personne
Mildred Mulenga and Felix Njoku, PANA Correspondents
Lusaka, Zambia (PANA) - Former Zambian President Kenneth Kaunda has urged Africans and their leaders to show strong commitment in the campaign to contain the spread of HIV/AIDS, instead of relying on the outside world. It is important to think about what Africa can do in the fight against AIDS. This will be the beginni
Windhoek, Namibia (PANA) - Namibia spent over 37.5 million US dollars in efforts to combat the incurable HIV/AIDS during the past decade, parliament was told on Friday. The country s Deputy Minister of Health and Social Services, Richard Kamwi told the House that the only achievement so far has been an increase in publ
New York, US (PANA) - The World Bank approved Friday a loan of 90.3 million dollars for Nigeria s AIDS programme and another 22 million dollars for a similar project in Burkina Faso . A statement by the Bank explained that the credit for Nigeria will support the country s three-year HIV/AIDS Emergency Action Plan, whos
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - Anti-retrovirals, the drugs that make it possible to curb the progress of AIDS, today constitute one of the few weapons Africa has to slow down the advance of a very powerful enemy. That is why there are wide predictions that the OAU summit which is underway in Lusaka will stress the need for bi
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - The United Nations Children s Fund (UNICEF) has decided to strengthen its co-operation programme with Benin within the next two years. UNICEF resident representative in Benin, Esther Guluma, told a meeting in Cotonou Thursday that between 2001 and 2003, the organisation would systematically inte
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - West African Education Ministers will meet in September to adopt a common strategy in combating the spread of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, which is also threatening the education sector. Ghanaian Education Minister Christopher Ameyaw-Akumfi, told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Accra Thursday that these
Tripoli, Libya (PANA) - Libya has commended an initiative by a US pharmaceutical group, Fayser, to distribute free of charge HIV/AIDS drugs to 50 poor countries. Libyan foreign ministry officials described the initiative as a positive response to the Libyan leader, Col. Muammar Kadhafi s call during last April s Africa
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Some 150 delegates from 30 African countries and 40 international donors will meet next month in Boksburg, South Africa, to map out strategies to combat the AIDS pandemic in Africa. South Africa s Anglican Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane announced the initiative in an interview with PAN
Windhoek, Namibia (PANA) - You may call it a week of concerted action against HIV/AIDS. And so it was. At the United Nations in New York, several African leaders were meeting the international community urging it to step up efforts to save the continent from the scourge of the pandemic. As if by connivance or coinc
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - The Mozambican Christian Council which groups the main protestant Christian denominations, has earmarked five million US dollars to finance a five-year strategic plan to combat the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Mozambique news agency quoted the council s secretary general Lucas Amosse as saying Wednesd
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa s constitutional and technology minister Dr Audrey van Zyl, has added her voice to calls for the imposition of compulsory HIV-tests on sex offenders as soon as possible. The minister, who is also responsible for gender issues, the youth and the handicapped, said she welcome
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenyan authorities said Wednesday that they are organising a stakeholders consultative forum to deliberate on the plight faced by children orphaned by AIDS. The campaign is part of the country s strategies to implement resolutions arrived at the UN World Summit for Children in 1990, which adopte
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire (PANA) - More than a million out of the Ivorian population estimated at 15 million are currently living with HIV/AIDS, according to the country s foreign minister, Abou Drahamane Sangare. Speaking on his return from the recent UN General Assembly session devoted to AIDS, the minister said the gov
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa s Health minister Molefi Sefularo Tuesday in Zeerust launched a project aimed at preventing the transmission of HIV from mothers to their children. The Tlhabane Community Health Centre and Lehurutshe Hospital have been selected as sites for piloting the programme. The p
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - Another Nigerian Church has joined the growing league of local Churches making HIV/AIDS test mandatory for prospective couples seeking marriage. Worried by the rising rate of HIV infection in the south-eastern State of Enugu, the Anglican Diocese in the State has directed its Parishes to ensure
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - In a bid to beef up government efforts to halt the spread of Aids in Tanzania, the country s health experts have launched a two-year advocacy campaign. Their main goal is to do away with the stigma and discrimination problems associated with HIV/Aids infection. Under the Tanzania Ai
Douala, Cameroon (PANA) - Cameroonians living with HIV/AIDS and who wanted to attend the 25-27 June UN summit on the pandemic were refused visas at the American embassy in Yaounde, medical sources in the Cameroonian capital said. The embassy gave no explanation for the refusal to deliver visas to the applicants. Ma
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi has announced plans to review his country s laws to prevent the further spread of HIV/AIDS. Speaking in Nairobi Saturday on his return from New York, where he attended a special UN General Assembly session on AIDS, Moi he vowed his administration would do everyth
Kinshasa, DR Congo (PANA) - Teachers who have died of AIDS in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in the past two years have left 27,000 children without instructors, according to an inquiry carried out by Progres des Nations magazine, UNICEF publication. Even though AIDS has affected all the sectors of society,
New York, US (PANA) - Mozambican Health Minister Francisco Songane has said that he expects concrete actions from the just ended special session of the UN General Assembly on HIV/AIDS. The country s news agency (AIM) quoted Sangane as saying the meeting was a great victory, adding that Mozambique expects t
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa s official opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) said the country s fight against AIDS took another step backwards on Wednesday when President Thabo Mbeki again expressed doubts about the existence of the epidemic. Mbeki who addressed a National Press Club luncheon in Washing
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA)- Kenya s Members of Parliament urged the government Thursday to access all dormant bank accounts and use the money to fight the Aids scourge. The legislators claimed some company executives were taking advantage of their positions to access such accounts for personal use. We can use the money
New York, United States (PANA) - Political and business leaders and representatives of civil society organisations concluded a three-day meeting on AIDS at the UN Wednesday, with a blueprint to guide international efforts in the fight against the epidemic. The blueprint, contained in a declaration of commitment by worl
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - A report by Botswana s Parliamentary select Committee has revealed that HIV/AIDS prevalence among young mothers is stabilising and even declining in the country. Analysis on age specific prevalence suggest that overall HIV prevalence rate among young mothers (15-49 years) is stabilising and
New York, UN (PANA) - Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa has said that his country should be able to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS in the next five years, given the current level of national mobilisation against the disease. We are now at the stage of all-round mobilisation that will result in the total reversal of th
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa has told the ongoing UN General Assembly special session on Aids that it is practically impossible for poor developing countries to develop capacity for treating all sexually transmitted infections and for HIV testing and counselling. Mkapa said la
New York, UN (PANA) - Doctors Without Borders, a leading international charity organisation of medical practitioners, has decried the general lack of commitment to treatment of HIV/AIDS patients by delegations at the ongoing special session of the UN General Assembly on AIDS. Members of the group, known by its French a
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - At the 4th international congress on medical progress and quality of life in the 21st Century, UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura last Monday decried unequal access to medical care, and stressed his organisation s role in education on AIDS prevention. A UNESCO release quoted Matsuura
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa s opposition Democratic Alliance party has expressed disappointment that President Thabo Mbeki will not attend the UN General Assembly session on AIDS under way in New York. South Africa is represented at the session by health minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang. Presiden
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - The Pfizer Foundation has plans to fund a study in Uganda to determine which preventive measures have been most effective in curbing HIV infection. The study will be conducted over 18 months and be done in collaboration with UNAIDS
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - UNDP Administrator Mark Malloch Brown has urged world leaders to use their full capacity to do more to tackle the alarming spread of HIV/AIDS. A world that spent an estimated 500 billion US dollars to tackle the elusive Y2K bug on our computers must be able to do more to tackle a tragedy that ha
New York, UN (PANA) - Fifty-eight countries, 40 of them from Africa, have expressed interest in gaining access to lower-priced drugs for the treatment of HIV/AIDS and opportunistic diseases, UNAIDS , the UN lead agency on AIDS, has announced. UNAIDS said in a statement Monday in New York at the beginning of a three-day
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - Some 40 sub-Saharan countries are among 58 countries worldwide that have expressed interest in gaining access to lower-price drugs - including treatments for opportunistic infections and antiretroviral therapy, the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS, or UNAIDS , said Mon
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang is leading the South African delegation to the special UN General Assembly session on AIDS, which begins Monday in New York. The heads of state from Ethiopia , Kenya , Nigeria ,
Bujumbura, Burundi (PANA) - Second Vice-President Mathias Sinamenye, is leading Burundi s delegation to the UN General Assembly s Special Session on AIDS, which opens in New York Monday. Official sources said Sinamenye, who left Bujumbura Saturday would use the opportunity of the meeting to highlight the plight of thou
New York, United States (PANA) - With 17 of its Heads of State and government scheduled to attend the UN General Assembly special session on HIV/AIDS, Africa would have the strongest representation at the three-day event opening Monday in New York. Billed to be the culmination of increasing global efforts to tackle the
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - Benin and the World Bank have signed a financial agreement for the disbursement of 120 million francs CFA (1 US dollar = 750 FCFA) destined for HIV/AIDS NGOs working in rural areas. Confirming the move Saturday, sources at Benin s National HIV/AIDS Control Programme said the money would enable N
Praia, Cape Verde (PANA) - Health authorities in Cape Verde have started developing a national plan to control HIV/AIDS for the period 2002-2006, official sources said. Public and private organisations involved in the fight against the pandemic recently met in Praia to adopt a common strategy on how to co-ordinate the
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi last evening left for New York, to attend the 26 session of the UN General Assembly on HIV/AIDS, slated for 25-27 June. Moi will join other world leaders on a campaign aimed at spurring large-scale political commitment and funding for the battle against AIDS.
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - Mozambican Prime Minister Pascoal Mocumbi has warned that unless political leaders deal frankly with questions of adolescent sexuality, there can be little hope of stopping the spread of the lethal disease AIDS in Africa. In an article entitled A Time for Frankness on AIDS and Africa , publi
Windhoek, Namibia (PANA) - Aids is no longer a health issue alone, but indeed a developmental issue, the director of Namibian College of Open Learning (NAMCOL), Frances van Wyk, said Thursday. While our country is struggling to create jobs and overcome poverty, the epidemic is destroying the most productive members of
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenyan parliamentarians were in uproar Thursday following revelations that the government refused a free offer of drugs to curb mother-to-child infections in HIV positive women. Public Health Minister Sam Ongeri was under pressure from irate legislators who claimed that top civil servants advise
Windhoek, Namibia (PANA) - The UN General Assembly will on Thursday convene a special session on HIV/AIDS in New York, USA. According to UNAIDS , the session will be a testament to the collective will of nations world-wide to join in redoubling their efforts against the epidemic which has devastated the world in the pa
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - If government censors get their way at next week s UN conference on HIV/AIDS, the denial and discrimination that have helped spread the disease will continue unabated, Human Rights Watch charged Wednesday. Several government delegations are attempting to delete from the draft declaration of the
Niamey, Niger (PANA) - Niger s public and private radio journalists Tuesday underwent a day-long training programme to help them improve their knowledge of the HIV/AIDS. The seminar, which was organised by the US Cultural Centre in Niamey, was themed: The media at the service of the fight against AIDS. Opening the wor
Bujumbura, Burundi (PANA) - Concentration of displaced persons in camps and promiscuity are blamed for the increasing rate of HIV infection in Burundi s population. The director of Burundi s national Aids and sexually transmitted infections control programme, Dr Joseph Wakana said Monday that camps of displaced persons
Rundu, Namibia (PANA) - AIDS has turned into a major killer in Namibia s Kavango region where it has rapidly increased mainly among people aged between 15-45 years. The Namibia Press Agency on Monday quoted Kavango Regional Council s AIDS Co-ordinator Vincent Likoro as saying HIV/AIDS had shown a real worrying trend in
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Public service officers in Kenya are to be drilled in dealing with new challenges posed by the HIV/AIDS in the country. Personnel Management head at the Presidency James Ongwae said Monday that because the pandemic had brought new realities in the workplace, contingency measures had to be taken.
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - A Ghanaian medical doctor has cautioned patients against turning to spiritual healers, warning that such clerics do not have the cure for HIV/AIDS. Dr Divine Apaloo told worshipers last Sunday at the Evangelical Presbyterian Church at Koforidua that besides, known drugs only prolong the lives of
Tripoli, Libya (PANA) - The trial of six Bulgarians - one doctor and five nurses - accused of contaminating 410 Libyan children with AIDS at the Benghazi paediatric hospital, 1050 km east of Tripoli, has been postponed to 22 September. The Bulgarians have been charged along with a Palestinian doctor and nine Libyan doc
Tripoli, Libya (PANA) - Lawyers defending six Bulgarian health personnel and a Palestinian doctor accused of infecting more than 400 Libyan children with HIV were expected to wind-up their submission Sunday in the Libyan People s Court. Hearing opened in Tripoli Saturday when the court rejected a defence request to pos
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (PANA) - A national network composed essentially of persons living with HIV/AIDS, was Saturday set up in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso at the end of a forum advocating greater involvement of patients in the fight against HIV. This network intends to be a framework for free exchange between sero-po
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - Senegalese Health minister Awa Marie Coll Seck will on Saturday in Dakar launch an initiative dubbed Secure the Future, directed at the plight of HIV/AIDS sufferers across West Africa. Financed by the Bristol Myers Squibb laboratories to the tune of 10 billion francs CFA (1 US dollar = 700 FCFA)
Bujumbura, Burundi (PANA) - Some 20 barbers in Bujumbura have undergone a training session on HIV/AIDS transmission and prevention in their daily activities. There is a general belief that the risks of AIDS transmission in barbershops are minimal. According to Dr. Josee Mbuzenakamwe, coordinator of the National Associa
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - There are growing fears in health and administrative circles in Africa, and especially in Kenya, that the battle against tuberculosis on the continent could be lost as a result of the high rate of HIV infection among its population. The fears are not isolated, going by statistics recently re
Accra, Ghana (PANA) - A Ghanaian doctor has described HIV/AIDS as a national disaster which requires a research also in forests and ecosystems. I believe that where a disease exists abundantly, the good Lord in his wisdom plants the treatment in the neighbourhood, Prof. Agyeman Badu Akosa, president of the Ghana Medica
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - Botswana Health minister Joy Phumaphi reported Tuesday that the country s house-to-house HIV/AIDS counselling pilot programme is succeeding. Briefing UN special envoy on HIV/AIDS Steven Lewis, Phumaphi asserted that the programme launched last December in some parts of the country is not onl
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya s national council of non-governmental organisations has accused the US agency for International Development (USAID) of having a racial outlook in the provision of HIV Drugs to Africans. The East African Standard newspaper on Wednesday quoted the council s chairman, Oduor Ong wen, as sayin
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya has set up a legal task force to look into different aspects related to the control of the HIV/AIDS pandemic and protection of its victims. Announcing formation of the unit in Nairobi Wednesday, Attorney-General Amos Wako said the disease posed many challenges to the Kenyan society. Th
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Thanks to an alliance between African and Western experts in infectious diseases, African health providers are soon to start benefiting from an ultra modern medical training centre to be based in Kampala, Uganda . In a statement issued in Nairobi, the Academic Alliance for Aids Care in Africa sa
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - Participants in a public debate on draft legislation seeking to protect workers who carry the HIV virus that causes AIDS on Monday called for severe measures against employers who discriminated against HIV-positive workers. The debate was organised by the Social Affairs Commission of the Moz
N djamena, Chad (PANA) - A study conducted Chad has reported more HIV/AIDS prevalence among they country s women than among men. The study on the socio-economic impact of AIDS found an over all prevalence of seven percent among men and 9 per cent among women. Carried out with financial assistance from the Population a
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - Nkosi Johnson, the 12-year old South African anti-AIDS activist was laid to rest at the weekend after succumbing to the incurable acquired immunodeficiency syndrome. The Cape Town boy, whose frail image hit the headlines and television screens since he fell into a comma last December, will be re
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador Harry Belafonte arrived in South Africa Monday morning with his wife Julie to assess the AIDS situation in the country. Belafonte is famous for his achievements as a recording artist, concert singer as well as film, theatre and television star, producer and hu
Harare, Zimbabwe (PANA) - Condom debate is heating up in Zimbabwe as it battles the spread of AIDS, which health officials say could result in zero-growth in the country s population next year. Zimbabwe, which recorded population growth of some 3.7 percent in the 1990s, is among the countries worst hit by AIDS in the w
Johannesburg, South Africa (PANA) - President Thabo Mbeki has been lambasted by AIDS activists and international media for failing to attend the funeral of Nkosi Johnson, South Africa s youngest AIDS activist. Former Zambian President Kenneth Kaunda, whose son died of AIDS some years ago, attended Nkosi s funeral Satur
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - The Kenyan ministry of health says it requires a whooping 2 million US dollars annually to finance its HIV/AIDS control and prevention activities. The head of the National Aids Control Body, Dr Mohamed Abdullah Friday said the amount is 10 percent of the country s annual revenue. He said as the
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya s estimated 2.3 million HIV/Aids sufferers may get access to cheap drugs by the end of June, the chairman of a parliamentary committee on health disclosed Thursday. Dr Newton Kulundu told a lobby group that parliament was likely to pass next week a watershed bill allowing for the parallel
Johannesburg, South Africa (PANA) - The leading story in South Africa this week is the death of 12-year-old Aids activist Nkosi Johnson. There cannot be a South African who has not been touched by the little Nkosi who so courageously and publicly epitomised the struggle against Aids in our country, writes Star colum
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya has announced that soon it would begin prosecuting persons who deliberately infected others with the HIV/AIDS. It will, in future, be a criminal offence through the Public Health Act, for anyone to deliberately infect others with the HIV/AIDS, said tourism, trade and industry minister Nich
Brazzaville, Congo (PANA) - Some fifty experts are convening a workshop to examine the spread of sexually transmissible diseases (STD) and HIV/AIDS along the River Congo-Oubangui-Chari and to adopt means to combat them. The experts from Congo, DR Congo, Central African Republic and
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - The WHO Wednesday expressed appreciation to the multinational pharmaceutical company, Pfizer , for its decision to offer fluconazole free of charge in least developed countries. This is very good news. I warmly welcome the announcement by Pfizer to offer to expand access to fluconazole, WHO Dir
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Hundeds of mourners on Wednesday paid tribute to 12-year-old Aids activist Nkosi Johnson who died Friday after a lengthy battle against the disease. At an emotional service at the Central Methodist Church in Johannesburg, the congregation reflected on Nkosi s brief life as well as his h
New York, US (PANA) - US pharmaceutical giant, Pfizer Incorporated offered Wednesday to provide its anti-fungal drug, Diflucan, free of charge to HIV/AIDS patients in 50 least developed countries. Fungal infections of the oesophagus is said to occur in 20 to 40 percent of HIV/AIDS patients. Pfizer chairman, Hank Mc
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - Botswana President Festus Mogae announced Tuesday that government would soon give free anti-retroviral treatment to all people living with HIV/AIDS in the country. The president told a group of visiting journalists that Botswana would afford the treatment after getting favourable offers from
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - An official of a Lagos-based NGO, the Society for Family Health (SFH) Tuesday debunked claims in certain circles in Nigeria that condoms do not protect users against HIV/AIDS. Its general manager, Bright Enweremadu, said in Lagos that when used correctly and consistently, condoms offered 98 perc
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenyan authorities announced Tuesday that they were working on legislation that would allow the importation of anti-retroviral generic drugs. Trade Minister Nicholas Biwott also said the authorities have also proposed an amendment to the Industrial Property Act so as to increase affordable acces
Windhoek, Namibia (PANA) - The Mineworkers Union of Namibia (MUN) wants government to set up a National AIDS Fund to help fight the pandemic in the country. In a resolution by its National Congress 2 June, the Union said the fund would also assist children orphaned by AIDS. All stakeholders are required to contribute
Cotonou, Benin (PANA) - Some 60 journalists from Benin s print and broadcast media begin an AIDS training Wednesday in Bohicon, 100-km from Cotonou. The 10-day training under the theme AIDS: Education through the media, the key to success, seeks to effect change in sex behaviours change among the population, through me
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PANA) - An Indian company, CIPL s Pharmaceuticals, plans to market in Tanzania, cheaper HIV/AIDS anti-retroviral drugs as the government grapples with the epidemic, the local press reported Tuesday. The African newspaper reported that this was part of issues discussed by a Tanzanian delegation
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire (PANA) - Cote d Ivoire requires some 12 billion CFA francs for the implementation of its 2001-2002 action plan for AIDS control, a government official said. (750 CFA francs=1USD). Assana Sangare, a junior Minister in charge of AIDS control, who presented an assessment report of the action plan to
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - Botswana president Festus Mogae leaves Wednesday for South Africa to attend a regional economic summit in which he will lead discussions on leadership commitment in the fight against HIV/AIDS. Mogae will be accompanied by his finance and development planning minister Baledzi Gaolathe, works,
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - Mozambican Health Minister Francisco Songane Friday said that generic anti-retroviral drugs will be available later this year in units of the Mozambican national health service. The drugs are used to prolong the lives of people infected with HIV, the virus that causes the lethal disease AIDS
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - The joint UN programme on HIV/AIDS Friday expressed sorrow over the death of South African AIDS activist, 12-year-old Nkosi Johnson, saying we have lost a champion, a hero in the fight against AIDS . Nkosi symbolised hope and will continue to do so for millions of people affected by AIDS,
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Messages of condolences are streaming in following the death of 12-year-old AIDS victim Nkosi Johnson who died in his sleep in the early hours of Friday. Nkosi who became South Africa s youngest AIDS activist and warmed the hearts of millions of people around the world with his fight ag
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa and France on Friday expressed support for efforts being made to mobilise the international community in the fight against the incurable HIV/AIDS pandemic. In joint declaration issued at the end of French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin s two-day visit, the two governments hig
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - Twelve-year-old Nkosi Johnson, who became South Africa s youngest AIDS activist and warmed the hearts of millions of people around the world with his fight against the disease, died in his sleep in the early hours of Friday morning. Nkosi, who was born with the virus that causes the inc
New York, US (PANA) - Nigeria has appealed for international support for Africa s efforts to tackle the HIV/AIDS pandemic, which it says endangers the continent s future. The Permanent Secretary in Nigeria s Women Affairs and Youth Development Ministry, Peter Okunromade told a meeting in New York Tuesday, ahead of the
Harare, Zimbabwe (PANA) - Life expectancy in Zimbabwe is expected to drop from the current 44 years to 27 years in the next 10 years due to AIDS, UNICEF said Tuesday. The UN agency said Zimbabwe, where an estimated 5,000 people die every week from AIDS, was one of the countries worst affected by the incurable disease.
Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - Botswana s main diamond mining company has announced that firms wishing to do business with it must support its health policy on combating the spread of HIV/AIDS. Debswana Company has realised that running HIV/AIDS programmes on its own without the cooperation of partner companies was counte
Maputo, Mozambique (PANA) - The Mozambican and Japanese governments on Thursday signed an agreement under which Japan is to provide 990 million yen (about 9.24 million US dollars) for improving rural water supply in the central province of Zambezia. The money will be used to build 148 new boreholes and to rehabilitate
Lagos, Nigeria (PANA) - A Nigerian non-governmental organisation, Journalists Against AIDS on Wednesday launched its media resource centre and new Website in Lagos as part of efforts to sensitise the media and the public to the scourge. JAAIDS Project Director, Omololu Falobi, said his organisation was Nigeria s first
Harare, Zimbabwe (PANA) - Two international drug manufacturers have slashed the prices of AIDS medicines for Zimbabwe, pharmaceutical officials said Thursday. Ken Ralston, chairman of a national drug importing agency, said Abbott and Bristle Myers-Squibbs had reduced their prices for AIDS drugs to importers in Zimbabwe
Cairo, Egypt (PANA) - Leaders who, in callous indifference, watch as their populations succumb to AIDS, should be made to answer for their actions just as persons involved in war crimes are tried, a UNICEF official has suggested. UNICEF s regional director for East and Southern Africa, Urban Jousson told PANA that it w
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) - South Africa s official opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) has unveiled a living AIDS policy discussion document in an attempt to implement a comprehensive anti-retroviral treatment programme in the country. DA leader Tony Leon, MP, said South Africa cannot wait for a definitive conclu
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - US Secretary of State Colin Powell on Sunday in Nairobi called for an all-out war to contain the spread of HIV/AIDS, saying the disease has assumed the dimension of a crisis not only for Kenya but for Africa and the whole world. Powell made the call when he visited an HIV/AIDS programme being fu
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - A new report of surveys and profile of youths in eleven African countries says that at least half of sexually experienced adolescents are ignorant of the ravages of the AIDS pandemic. The report by the Population Reference Bureau surveyed Ghana , Kenya,
Maputo, Mozambique - Mozambique s deputy national director of health Avertino Barreto has called for a more aggressive approach to disseminating information about the incurable disease AIDS to the public. Giving a lecture Tuesday at Maputo s Higher University and Polytechnic Institute (ISPU) on social marketing again
Nairobi, Kenya - Governments in East Africa and the Great Lakes region have agreed on a common regional action plan against HIV/AIDS along the region s trunk roads. The plan was among major resolutions agreed at a regional workshop in Nairobi last week, organised by the Rwanda-based Great Lakes Initiative on AIDS in
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia - Against the backdrop of increasing deaths from malaria, tuberculosis and AIDS, the Ethiopian medical association meeting in its 37th annual conference, has called for better access of the population to essential medicines. Opening the conference Tuesday, association president Adem Ali insist
Bamako, Mali - A busy schedule awaits US Secretary of State Colin Powell who arrives in Bamako on Wednesday to begin an African tour. According to a reliable source, Powell is scheduled to hold discussion with the Malian President Alpha Oumar Konare, who is also current chairman of the Economic Community of West Africa
Windhoek, Namibia - Namibian president Sam Nujoma Tuesday urged the country s youth to change their attitudes towards AIDS and to make use of HIV/AIDS information readily available to them. In a speech read on his behalf during an AIDS awareness campaign themed, Change your attitude - AIDS is real, the president said:
Lusaka, Zambia - A self-confessed HIV-positive Zambian man, has been sentenced to 30 months in jail for forcing a 13-year-old girl to have sex with him. A Lusaka Magistrate s court ruled Monday that Tresfer Miti must serve with hard-labour for luring the girl into a room at her parents home and forcing her into sex th
Blantyre, Malawi (PANA) - The Malawi government has approved that the AIDS drug Nevirapine should be administered free of charge to HIV-positive pregnant women in the country. Wesley Sangala, Chief Technical Advisor in the Ministry of Health, told PANA the government in April signed the agreement with a German pharmace
Dakar, Senegal - Experts in education on Monday began a workshop in Dakar as a follow-up to the seminar on the contribution of non-governmental and civil society organisations to education for all conference scheduled next December in Bamako, Mali . Organised by the World Bank and UNESCO in collaboration with the C
Port-Louis, Mauritius - Mauritius plans to invest 2.6 billion rupees to improve health services during the next five years. (28.5 rupees = 1 USD). The funds would be used for the construction of new hospitals and health centres, modernise existing services and purchase new vehicles and equipment. According to an offici
Cotonou, Benin - A teleconference on AIDS, with participants in four African capitals and Washington in the United States , will be held Wednesday and Thursday. Seven public health experts from Howard University in Washington arrived in Cotonou Monday to take part in the conference at Benin National University.
Cape Town, South Africa - Excellent results have been reported following the distribution of free Flucanozole medication to 200 HIV/AIDS patients in the Western Cape over the past two weeks. The success now enables health authorities to distribute the anti-fungal agent free of charge in more than 90 provincial and muni
Windhoek, Namibia - Deputy Chairperson of the Namibian National Council Margaret Mensah Thursday stirred a hornet s nest in the male-dominated House of Review when she proposed the legalisation of prostitution in the country. Contributing the 2001/02 Appropriation Bill debate in the House, Mensah said: Legalising sex
Dakar, Senegal - UN secretary-general Kofi Annan declared in Geneva Thursday that an international fund to combat HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis , and malaria would be a major tool for economic growth in the developing world. In a speech to the World Health Assembly, Annan said that in order to encourage development in many co
Harare, Zimbabwe - Zimbabwe s parliament on Thursday passed a tough sex law in a bid to curb the spread of HIV/AIDS. The Sexual Offences Act provides for stiffer prison sentences of up to 20 years for people found guilty of knowingly infecting others with AIDS. Under the new law, women raped and infected with the incur
Lagos, Nigeria - Following a growing trend among Nigerian Churches to demand HIV/AIDS test certificates from prospective marriage couples, a prominent Church leader has condemned the practice in the country. I don t think it is a good idea to demand such from would-be couples. I think it is a bit going too far, said S
Dakar, Senegal - Responding to HIV must be a core element of development policy, said Peter Piot, the executive director of the joint UN programme on HIV/AIDS Wednesday. Piot was speaking in statement delivered on his behalf at the third UN Conference on the Least Developed Countries being held in Brussels,
Nairobi, Kenya - Kenya s Laikipia West Rural Community Education Centre has been preaching the bible and urging displaced people to change sexual behaviour in a bid to prevent HIV/AIDS. The centre was established two years ago to help displaced families find solace and accommodation after being affected by the 1991 eth
Nairobi, Kenya - A new report by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) projects that deaths caused by HIV/AIDS in most affected African countries will reduce the labour force by as much as 26 percent by 2020. The report estimates that since 1985 some seven million agricultural workers have died of AIDS-related
Monrovia, Liberia - At least 22 under-18 soccer teams are locked in a tourney for the coveted George Weah trophy to raise HIV/AIDS awareness in the south-eastern port city of Buchanan. Buchanan, 100-km south-east of Monrovia reportedly recorded a high rate of HIV/AIDS prevalence after some East African contingents that
Johannesburg, South Africa - The South African Local Government Association in partnership with national departments of health, provincial and local authorities is training local councillors to help combat HIV/AIDS. Once they complete their course, the 18 councillors from all nine provinces who are being trained at Wil
Cape Town, South Africa - Until anti-retroviral drugs are available in the public sector, the official opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) believes the government should help to reduce their cost in the private sector and make them more accessible to the poor. Not only would this move increase considerably the number o
Dakar, Senegal - A forum involving about 100 African pharmacists is scheduled to be held in Dakar from 18-21 June on the theme security and accessibility of medicines in Africa. According to the Senegalese News Agency, the forum, follow-up to those of Bamako ( Mali ) and Cotonou (
Dakar, Senegal - World Health Organisation (WHO) Director-General Gro Harlem Brundtland welcomed the announcement by the United States government to contribute 200 million US dollars to a global HIV/AIDS and health fund aimed at fighting AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
Niamey, Niger - Niger s religious leaders have been enjoined to add their voices to the campaign against HIV-AIDS and sexually transmissible diseases (STDs). At a workshop participants recommended that the authorities access Muslim teachers to public media and encourage them to deliver sermons on AIDS and STDs. Whi
Nairobi, Kenya - Kenya s parliament is considering a bill that would allow importation and local manufacture of cheap generic drugs for treating AIDS sufferers, but the country has no capacity to test the efficacy of the drugs. According to the National Quality Control and Laboratory Board chair, Prof. Gilbert Kokwaro,
Johannesburg, South Africa - South Africans on Monday began weeklong activities to show support for people living with HIV/AIDS, raise awareness and mobilise community involvement in the fight against the incurable disease. They have joined thousands of people around the world in the 18th International AIDS Candlelight
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso - French-speaking African countries have been urged to adopt and carry out a second generation surveillance strategy to stop the spread of HIV infections. A weeklong meeting on the intensification of HIV surveillance in African francophone countries ended Friday in Ouagadougou calling on those
Washington, US - President Olusegun Obasanjo Friday called on all nations, businesses, foundations and individuals to join the fight against AIDS and other infectious diseases by contributing to the global AIDS fund recently proposed. Obasanjo, who discussed strategies to halt the spread of AIDS and other infectious di
Cape Town, South Africa - A South African HIV/AIDS consortium including Community AIDS Response (CARE) Friday held a placard demonstration to protest against a Johannesburg HIV Clinic which has stopped taking any new patients. Various AIDS service organisations, health care workers, doctors and medical students called
Nairobi, Kenya - Kenya s National AIDS Control Council (NAC) says it needs about 14 billion Kenyan shillings (1 US dollar = 80 Ksh) to implement a five-year national strategic plan for HIV/AIDS control. NAC deputy director Patrick Orego said the council has managed to source only 7 billion shillings from Government and
Monrovia, Liberia - Health authorities in Monrovia are getting concerned about increasing resistance to chloroquine, the first line treatment for malaria. We have been conducting studies on the resistant strain, including closely monitoring patients while under treatment with chloroquine, Dr Benjamin Vonhn, director o
Harare, Zimbabwe - Health authorities in Harare conceded Thursday that tuberculosis was on the rise in the Zimbabwean capital due to HIV/AIDS and overcrowding. Municipal medical doctor Stanley Mungofa said TB cases had risen more than four times in the last 10 years in the city, from 2 000 cases in 1990 to over 9 000 l
Windhoek, Namibia - The Namibian capital has been chosen to host the secretariat of the Alliance of Mayors and Municipal Leaders on HIV/AIDS, the country s news agency reported Wednesday. Nampa said that mayors from across the continent chose Windhoek during their meeting last week in Abidjan,
Nairobi, Kenya - Governments within the Great Lakes region have been urged to harmonise their programmes to target migratory populations in order to forestall the widespread scare of HIV/AIDS infection in the area. Dr. Innocent Ntagamira, the executive secretary of the Rwanda-based Great Lakes Initiative on AIDS (GLIA)
Nairobi, Kenya - More than 80 percent of blood donated by students and teachers in Kenya s Nyanza Province schools has the HIV virus that causes AIDS, according to health officials. Nyanza Provincial Commissioner, Peter Raburu, said that despite extensive sensitisation campaigns in the region, the rate at which pupils
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire - About 70 mayors from 17 African countries are holding a three-day workshop in Abidjan devoted to the search for affective measures to reduce the socio-economic impact of HIV/AIDS in their respective cities. The meeting of the Alliance of African Mayors against AIDS which opened Wednesday will e
Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania - Health workers in Tanzania s rural areas are now quite aware of HIV/AIDS and how the disease is transmitted but many of them lack the proper protective gear. This has brought new problems as the workers have resorted to using whatever is available to replace rubber gloves, thus making them eve
Lagos, Nigeria - Decisions taken at last week s African Summit in Abuja on HIV/AIDS will amount to nothing unless they are translated to action to save the continent from the AIDS pandemic, according to a senior official of the UN agency for AIDS. Meetings like this are political meetings, and the way that one can work
Kinshasa, DR Congo - At least 50 transport operators including drivers attended open days in Kinshasa organised by the Fondation Femmes Plus a non-governmental organisation that offers counselling to people living with HIV/AIDS in the Democratic Republic of the Congo . Established in July 1994 by a group of women, FFP
Bamako, Mali - The Malian health ministry last weekend launched a vast anti-AIDS campaign targeting Bamako s bus terminals to sensitise passengers on ways to prevent the incurable pandemic. The director of the national health information, education and communication centre Abdoulaye Coulibaly said the objective of the
Lagos, Nigeria - Fired by the renewed vigour of African leaders to battle the HIV/AIDS scourge, Nigeria s President Olusegun Obasanjo has announced the setting up of a West African HIV/AIDS coordination centre in the country. Nigeria will be an AIDS coordinating centre for West Africa, Obasanjo said in Abuja Monday wh
Kampala, Uganda (PANA) , The US government will give Uganda 50 million dollars in a five-year programme towards the prevention and fight against HIV/AIDS. Visiting Secretary of State Colin Powell dropped the hint Sunday at Mulago Hospital in Kampala where he had gone to meet people living with HIV, after holding talks
Abuja, Nigeria - A new global campaign launched world-wide Thursday to improve the welfare and to protect the lives of children elicited more than 5,000 responses on its first day, according to UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy. Speaking at a media briefing in Abuja Friday, Bellamy expressed satisfaction with the
Abuja, Nigeria - The OAU Secretary General Salim Ahmed Salim s report submitted to the African summit on HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and other infectious diseases which opened in Abuja (Nigeria) Thursday, paints a very bleak picture of the scope of the pandemic in Africa. According to the report, the HIV/AIDS pandemic w
Bujumbura, Burundi - Burundi has reached an agreement with four pharmaceutical laboratories to obtain anti-retrovirals at a cost 90 percent less than in the United States . Revealing this at a news conference in Bujumbura, the director of the national AIDS and STD control programme, Dr. Joseph Wakana identified the com
Lagos, Nigeria - In a sharp blow to renewed efforts by African leaders to confront the HIV/AIDS pandemic headlong, a church in Nigeria has ordered compulsory HIV/AIDS test for its members willing to be married in the church. The Baptist church, one of the largest denominations in Nigeria, at the weekend ordered its min
Abuja, Nigeria - The Libyan revolutionary leader, Col. Moammar Kadhafi Friday accused the US Central Intelligence Agency or CIA of being responsible for the spread of HIV/AIDS throughout the world. The issue today, which no one dares address, is the origin of the virus; namely who created HIV/AIDS. The door is totally
Bujumbura, Burundi - The Burundian defence ministry recently organised a two-day training seminar to sensitise women army recruits on ways to avoid HIV/AIDS infection. Burundi has introduced a new regulation, which requires young girls to undergo military training after completing high school. One of the trainers D
Brussels, Belgium - The European Union has expressed support for UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan s appeal for the creation of a world AIDS control fund, an EU statement said in Brussels Friday. Annan made the appeal at the African Summit on AIDS, tuberculosis and Malaria that ended Friday in Abuja,
Dakar, Senegal - Friday s announcement by the OAU that the much-awaited African Union is to be declared 26 May, a day after Africa Liberation Day, should normally evoke a sense of double celebration among Pan-Africanists. But while officials of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) may be beating the drums of another
Washington, US - The president of the World Bank, James Wolfensohn said the institution would shortly provide additional 500 million US dollars toward the fight against HIV/AIDS in Africa. Wolfensohn told a press conference Friday at the ongoing meeting of the Bank and the IMF in Washington that the fight against AIDS
Abuja, Nigeria - The African Union is to be declared 26 May after the mandatory 36 of OAU s 53 Member States have deposited their instruments of ratification of the Union s Constitutive Act, it was announced in Abuja, Nigeria, Friday. OAU Secretary General Salim Ahmed Salim said at the African AIDS Summit that the Act
Abuja, Nigeria - The Executive Director of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), Thoraya Obaid, Friday advocated stronger preventive effort to stem the spread of HIV/AIDS, as a ground-breaking African Summit on the pandemic wound up in Nigeria s capital city of Abuja. Obaid, one of several UN agency heads in town for the sum
Abuja, Nigeria - Making his second visit to Nigeria in nine months, but this time as a private citizen, former US President Bill Clinton stole the show at the opening session of the African AIDS Summit in Abuja Thursday, attracting the loudest ovation from the crowd. Apparently impressed with Clinton s larger-than-life
Abuja, Nigeria - UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo have called for the establishment of a global trust fund to help raise the necessary resources to battle HIV/AIDS and other infectious diseases. Speaking at opening of the African AIDS Summit in Abuja, the Nigerian capital Thursda
Abuja, Nigeria - Against the grim realities of HIV/AIDS devastation in Africa, Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo has described Africa as an endangered continent. What we have is a pandemic out of control, which is gravely threatening our nations, our children, our future. We are an endangered continent, Obasanjo sa
Abuja, Nigeria - The African Summit on AIDS, Tuberculosis and Other Related Infectious Diseases opened in Abuja Thursday with several African Heads of State, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and former US President Bill Clinton attending. As organisers awaited the arrival of more leaders, those at the opening session in
Dakar, Senegal - At the on-going African summit on HIV/AIDS in Abuja, Nigeria , UNESCO has recommended preventive education as a vital component in the continent s struggle against the scourge. Presenting Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura s message to the forum Thursday, Assistant Director-General for Africa Nouréini
Bamako, Mali - The possibility of manufacturing generic drugs in Mali is far away despite the hope raised by the recent withdrawal of a court case lodged by pharmaceutical companies against the South African government over the issue, according to sources at the Malian Factory of Pharmaceutical Products (UMPP). The
Abuja, Nigeria - UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan s call for world-wide response to the HIV/AIDS crisis, at the ongoing Africa AIDS Summit in Abuja Thursday, has received instant support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Through our charitable foundation, Melinda and I will support the Secretary-General s call
Abuja, Nigeria - Luc Montaigner, the French scientist, who in 1983 announced the discovery of the AIDS virus with American Robert Gallo, has arrived in Abuja for the African AIDS Summit, called to forge a common front against the disease. Montaigner arrived at the Abuja International Conference Centre venue of the Summ
Bamako, Mali - A five-day workshop drilling participants on quality HIV diagnosis is into the third day in Bamako, Mali. Organised by the Malian Health ministry in collaboration with the World Health Organisation (WHO), the workshop would also train participants to identify and propose solutions to problems related to
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire - The Ivorian government would next 3 May unveil its 2000-2002 HIV/AIDS control plan of action, official sources in Abidjan said at the start of the week. The plan was earlier last week adopted at a workshop that revised a wider 2000-2004 plan of action. Health ministry sources said the plan,
Dakar, Senegal - The Abidjan-based African Development Fund (ADF) Wednesday approved a grant of one million Units of Account, approximately 1.30 million US dollars, to support Zambia s national AIDS control programme for two years. The funds, to be disbursed from August 2001, will help strengthen the capacity of the Na
Nairobi, Kenya - If South Africans are celebrating the victory in the recent case in which 39 major pharmaceutical firms had challenged a law permitting the making or importation of cheaper AIDS drugs, drugs access lobby groups in Kenya are over the moon. The Kenya Coalition of NGOs on Access to Medicines had, in colla
Nairobi, Kenya - The importation of the parallel generic version of HIV/AIDS drugs could be allowed in Kenya once a bill recently tabled in parliament becomes law. According to health authorities in Nairobi the Intellectual Property Bill would lead to a remarkable reduction of prices of HIV/AIDS drugs if endorsed.
Monrovia, Liberia - Participants at a just-ended workshop on HIV/AIDS here have recommended incentives for the formation of an association of People Living With Aids (PLWA). They want the government to provide salary support and anti-retroviral drugs and other protection for the first 10 infected persons who come forwa
Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania - The International Labour Organisation has circulated to all member countries a draft code it expects to be accepted as a global guide on elimination of discrimination against HIV/AIDS victims in workplaces. If adopted at the forthcoming general conference of the ILO, due to be held May in Gene
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso - The Netherlands has offered Burkina Faso reagents for HIV tests and medicines for treatment of opportunistic diseases related to AIDS valued at 325 million CFA F. The Dutch ambassador in Ouagadougou Wednesday handed over the donation to officials of the national AIDS control centre or CNLS.
Dakar, Senegal - A legal consultant with the Dakar-based African Council of AIDS Service Organisations (AfriCASO), has called on African governments to mobilise resources for anti-retroviral treatment for HIV-positive pregnant women. In an exclusive with PANA, Dorothy Asiedu insisted that policymakers and the internati
New York, UN - UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan says dealing with the HIV/AIDS scourge in Africa requires the co-operation of all leaders on the continent, working together and mobilising their whole societies. Ahead of his trip to Abuja, Nigeria to attend an African Summit on AIDS and other communicable diseases, Anna
Cape Town, South Africa - In a historic breakthrough for people living with HIV/AIDS, the South African government and major international pharmaceutical companies on Thursday reached a settlement in their court battle over legislation governing medicine. The Pharmaceutical Manufacturer s Association (PMA) and about 40
Kampala, Uganda - President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda has proposed a fund-raise by African leaders finance anti- retroviral treatment for the world s 36 million HIV carriers. We could fund-raise among ourselves, the Ugandan leader said in Kampala Thursday at the opening of a three-day international conference on better
Cape Town, South Africa - The historic agreement between the South African government and major international pharmaceutical companies over legislation governing medicine is being hailed around the world. The Pharmaceutical Manufacturer s Association (PMA) and 39 local and international pharmaceutical companies on Thur
Dakar, Senegal - African leaders are expected to endorse the Consensus and Plan of Action of the African Development Forum (ADF) during their summit next week in Abuja on HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and other infectious diseases. The ADF agreed on the consensus and plan of action in the fight against HIV/AIDS last December
Monrovia, Liberia - Liberian health minister Peter Coleman is perturbed that his countrymen are still taking the issue of HIV/AIDS to be a myth. Coleman told the opening session of a three-day national representative workshop Tuesday that some 246,000 persons were living with HIV or AIDS. This alarming situation s
Dakar, Senegal - A legal consultant with the Dakar-based African Council of AIDS Service Organisations (AfriCASO) has called on African governments to mobilise resources for providing anti-retroviral treatment to HIV-positive pregnant women. Dorothy Asiedu told PANA that policymakers and the international community in
Bamako, Mali - The Malian government has agreed to set aside about one billion CFA francs annually in support of the estimated 130,000 people living with HIV/AIDS in the country. (700 CFA francs=1USD). Mali with an estimated 10 million population, is said to have a 3.5 percent HIV/AIDS prevalence rate. The governme
Nairobi, Kenya - Police in Nairobi have been mobilised to prepare for an impending raid on lodgings and brothels in a move aimed at combating the HIV/AIDS scourge in the Kenyan capital The Nairobi provincial commissioner Cyrus Maina said that the high number of lodgings and brothels in the city encourages promiscuity a
Lagos, Nigeria - A middle-aged man, Auwalu Abbas, has stabbed a prostitute to death for confessing to have infected him with the virus that causes AIDS, local media reported Tuesday. The report said Abbas, a tailor, stabbed Aisha with a pair of scissors in his shop in the northern city of Kano, after the prostitute tol
Dakar, Senegal - United Nations secretary general Kofi Annan will on 26 April outline key priorities in the fight against the incurable AIDS pandemic, Tuberculosis and other related infectious diseases in Abuja, Nigeria . According to a news release from the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS received by PANA in Dakar on T
Dakar, Senegal - The heads of denominations under the All Africa Conference of Churches (AACC) are to meet in Dakar from 23-25 April to discuss the scourge of AIDS, the Senegalese news agency reported. The agency quoted a statement issued by the protestant church as saying Senegal was chosen as the venue because of th
UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan is to attend the 25-27 April conference on HIV/AIDS slated for Abuja, Nigeria , UN spokesman, Fred Eckhard has announced. The conference expected to bring high level attention to the AIDS scourge ravaging African countries is being organised by Nigeria and the Organisation of African Un
Tripoli, Libya - A two-day conference on the challenges of AIDS in North African countries, ended late Wednesday in Tripoli, with a call on Africanleaders to support their national AIDS Control Committees. The meeting, organised by the Tripoli-based African Centre for Applied Research and Social Development Training (C
Bujumbura, Burundi - About thirty boys and girls from secondary schools in Burundi this week took part in a two-day workshop acquainting them with the dangers of HIV/AIDS and preventive measures. Organisers said they selected the youths on the basis of their family experiences and their potential for disseminating acqu
Paris, France - The Communist party in France Thursday launched a national and European campaign to mobilise French and EU parliamentarians in support of an international regulation that would authorise the production, import and export of cheaper anti HIV/AIDS treatment drugs. The party s national secretary, Robert Hu
Cotonou, Benin - HIV-infected children who are below 10 years of age in Benin will be treated free of charge, under the government s plan to make antiretroviral drugs accessible to HIV-infected patients. It is estimated that 70,000 people in Benin are presently living with the AIDS virus. According to the coordinat
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire - Stakeholders in the Ivorian economic field have been urged to support scientific research by the country s academics because end-products would eventually benefit their ventures. Speaking at the 2000 Scientific Research Award presentation ceremeony, Cote d Ivoire s higher education and research
Kigali, Rwanda - More than 40 delegates comprising mostly First Ladies from sub Saharan states are expected to attend a three-day summit next month in Kigali on children and the prevention of HIV/AIDS. The First Lady of Rwanda, Jeannette Kagame told a news conference in Kigali Tuesday that the meeting would be part of
Yaounde, Cameroon - The Cameroonian government is providing public hospitals with 16 centres to distribute anti-retrovirals to people living with HIV/AIDS. The centres, which would specialise in the care and treatment of HIV/AIDS patients, would screen sero-positive pregnant women with a view to curbing maternal transm
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia - HIV/AIDS now accounts for about 50 percent of total hospital admissions in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, where casualty from the incurable disease has also risen, according to medical sources. Getachew Fisseha, Head of the Addis Ababa HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control office, said the high A
Bamako, Mali - The Malian government has signed agreements with four western pharmaceutical companies to reduce the prices of anti-retroviral drugs to less than 89 percent of what is applied in the United States . Announcing this in Bamako Saturday, the cabinet said that these accords would enable the government subsid
Tripoli, Libya - The Tripoli-based African Centre for Applied Research and Training in Social Development is organising a two-day meeting beginning Tuesday on AIDS Challenges in North Africa Countries . The gathering is one of the preparatory meetings ahead of the African summit later this month in Abuja,
Cape Town, South Africa - South Africa s official opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) has described the government s long-awaited report by the Presidential AIDS Advisory Panel as an expensive failure . The convening of the panel, which first met in May last year, sparked international controversy over President Thabo
Niamey, Niger - United States Peace Corps has installed condom dispensers in bars and restaurants of Niamey, Niger, to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS, the US volunteer organisation has announced. The dispensers are very practical. You put a 50 cfa coin, press a button and get a box containing two condoms , said a bar pa
Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania - Tanzania has acquired a 374,668 US dollar grant to establish a commission to co-ordinate the fight against the HIV/AIDS pandemic in the country. The UN Development Programme (UNDP) and the Royal Danish Embassy donated funds on a fifty-fifty basis. According to a statement released by the UN o
Lusaka, Zambia - The US government has given Zambia about six million dollars to strengthen activities against HIV/AIDS in the country with a 20-percent HIV prevalence rate. The donation will support a wide range of activities including condom social marketing, communication programmes,voluntary counselling and testing
Nairobi, Kenya - A Kenyan AIDS patient who was in the process of filing a lawsuit against her relatives for locking her out of a family business and denying her due share of profits, has died. Beatrice Wanyonyi was last week allowed by a Kenyan court to file the suit free of charge on the grounds that she was a pauper.
Cape Town, South Africa - The Annual Report by the Office of the Inspecting Judge released this week, indicated that unless a cure is found, yearly AIDS related deaths among prisoners in South Africa would reach 7,000 by 2006 and to 45,000 in ten years. The South African Prisoners Organisation for Human Rights (SAPOHR)
Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania - Tanzania has acquired a 374,668 US dollar grant to establish a commission to co-ordinate the fight against the HIV/AIDS pandemic in the country. The UN Development Programme (UNDP) and the Royal Danish Embassy donated funds on a fifty-fifty basis. According to a statement released by the UN of
Accra, Ghana - Ghana s health minister Richard Anane said Tuesday said that current estimates indicated that over 600,000 people may be living with HIV/AIDS in his country. He said the figure represented 4.6 percent of the total population, adding that at the current prevalence rate, it is estimated that the number of
Cotonou, Benin - The International Care and Treatment Fund (FSTI), a body sponsored by French President Jacques Chirac and Health Minister Bernard Kouchner Tuesday made a grant of 1,600 million francs CFA (1 dollar = 700 FCFA) to AIDS patients in Benin. FSTI Director Jean Elie Malkin said the funds would make it possib
Cotonou, Benin - A regional workshop on AIDS, poverty eradication and debt reduction winds up in Cotonou, Benin on Wednesday. Delegates, experts and officials from 12 West and Central African countries are attending the workshop jointly organised by UNAIDS , UNDP and the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Dakar, Senegal - African Christian Democratic Party Member of Parliament Steve Stwart on Tuesday called for HIV tests for sentenced prisoners as part of the compulsory medical testing on admission. Stwart who is also ACDP s Correctional Services Spokesman was joined by members across political lines during a Portfolio
Windhoek, Namibia - Namibia s AIDS Care Trust (ACT) Thursday received 50,000 Namdollars from the Namibia De Beers Mining Corporation (Namdeb) to fund its activities. Receiving the money, ACT Director Apere David said HIV/AIDS is the most urgent concern in the country at present. This pandemic is wreaking havoc wit
Yaounde, Cameroon - The First Lady of Cameroon, Chantal Biya says she plans to hold a charity gala on Saturday in Yaounde to support people living with HIV/AIDS in Cameroon. The Solidarity Night , organised by the Circle of Friends of Cameroon, which is sponsored by the First Lady, wants to raise about 100 million CFA
Nairobi, Kenya - A local Kenyan company has announced plans to introduce limited insurance cover for HIV/AIDS patients in the country. The Chief Executive of Apollo Insurance Company Limited, Ashok Shah, said the programme would start in April. With a premium of 25,000 (about 300 US dollars), a client could get a limit
Nairobi, Kenya - Following the development of a vaccine by British and Kenyan scientists, and against the background of ongoing trials on humans in Kenya, the country appears set to become the first ever African country to carry out preventive AIDS vaccine tests. Scientists from Oxford University s Medical Research Cou
Cape Town, South Africa - The African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP) has described as cruel and unacceptable a decision by South Africa s health department to withhold Nevirapin from HIV-mothers. The ACDP was reacting to explanations Wednesday in Parliament by Dr Helen Rees of the Medicines Council, that the anti-AI
Maputo, Mozambique - An estimated 1.4 million Mozambicans are living with the HIV virus that causes the lethal disease AIDS, Deputy Health Minister Aida Libombo told the country s parliament on Tuesday. Libombo, who was briefing the Assembly on the AIDS epidemic, at the request of the parliamentary group of the ruling
Dakar, Senegal - African Catholic Archbishops Saturday in Dakar lent their voices to the growing campaign against the law suit filed by the South African Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association (PMA) to prevent the production of cheap generic drugs for the treatment of HIV/AIDS. In a Declaration at the end of its w
Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso - The National Organisation Committee (NOC) of the 12th International Conference on AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Diseases in Africa (CISMA) Friday evening in Ouagadougou met with media officials with a view to involving them in the successful organisation and holding of the event. The pur
New York, UN - As prospects for ensuring affordable access to AIDS drugs in poor countries become brighter, UNAIDS has announced that it has identified 34 suppliers of HIV-related medicines and diagnostic equipment that have expressed interest in participating in the UN programme that helps governments and other organi
Nairobi, Kenya - As soon as formal talks about AIDS and the shocks that the pandemic has caused to populations end, people just go back to their reckless sexual behaviour. This observation was made by a Japanese volunteer, Kazuko Minami, who has worked in Oyugis town, on Kenya s eastern peninsular of Lake Victoria, as
Mbabane, Swaziland - Traditional healers in Swaziland will now work hand-in-hand with hospitals and clinics in the fight against HIV/AIDS, the five-year Strategic Plan by the HIV/AIDS Crisis Management and Technical Committee said. The 2000-2005 strategic plan, already approved by cabinet, seeks to improve the indigeno
Dakar, Senegal - WHO director-general, Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland has reiterated the need for joint efforts to prevent the co-infection of patients by tuberculosis (TB) and HIV. TB is a leading killer of people living with HIV and it is highest in countries with the highest rates of HIV. Not only is this a health im
Dakar, Senegal - A Cameroonian priest today hinted in Dakar that the Catholic Church was preparing to take a stand in support of the government of South Africa in the law suit it is facing against a group of western pharmaceutical companies. Rev. Joseph Befe Ateba, spokesman for the standing committee of the Symposiu
Lagos, Nigeria - Nigerian military has embarked on extensive testing of its rank and file for HIV/AIDS, in a determined effort to tackle the scourge, Defence Minister Theophilus Danjuma has said. Speaking at the launch of an HIV/AIDS awareness campaign week in Lagos Tuesday, Danjuma said apart from the testing, the mil
Johannesburg - The South African Communist Party (SACP) has welcomed Cuba s offer of cheap drugs to fight AIDS. President Fidel Castro said on Sunday that Cuba had developed world-class AIDS drugs and wanted to help South Africa and Brazil circumvent patent laws to produce cheap generic drugs. This offer, once mor
Cape Town, South Africa - African Christian Democratic Party Member of Parliament Steve Swart has called for HIV tests for new prisoners as part of the compulsory medical testing on admission to prison. Following a Correctional Services Portfolio Committee hearing on proposed amendments to the Correctional Services Act
Lusaka, Zambia - About 300 people are dying of AIDS- related causes in Zambia everyday, the country s health minister, Enoch Kavindele disclosed Tuesday in Lusaka. Kavindele said the HIV/AIDS pandemic was serious and should be fought collectively through dissemination of information. As many as 300 people per day
Cape Town, South Africa - More than 10.5 million South Africans could lose their lives to AIDS by 2015, and an estimated one million children would be motherless by 2005. This is according to a report released by the independent South African Institute of Race Relations, which reveals that an estimated 10 percent of th
Accra, Ghana - The Programme Manager of Ghana s National AIDS Control Programme, Dr Kwaku Yeboah, Tuesday hinted that AIDS drugs would soon be accessible and affordable to all patients in the country. Yeboah said government was negotiating with a US-based pharmaceutical company for the importation of AIDS drugs at a pr
Johannesburg, South Africa - The South African government has rejected a large donation of free HIV test kits by a US pharmaceutical company because of high refrigeration cost, the health department said Sunday in Johannesburg. Those purchased on tender could be stored at room temperature, spokesperson Jo-Anne Colling
Accra, Ghana - Ghanaian Education Minister, Christopher Ameyaw-Akumfi Monday urged African countries to translate their preaching on HIV/AIDS into concrete action. Opening a Senior Experts Conference on HIV/AIDS and Education in ECOWAS States at Elmina, about 100-km west of Accra, he stressed that education and knowled
Johannesburg, South Africa - The controversy surrounding the South African government s rejection of a donation of one million free AIDS tests deepened Monday after a prominent public relations company was accused of staging protests. At the weekend press reports criticised the government for turning down an offer from
Cape Town, South Africa - The opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) and a leading AIDS-lobby group have slammed the South African government s decision to turn down a free consignment of one million HIV test kits. The donation was made by a US pharmaceutical company, Guardian Scientific Africa (GSI). South Africa s D
Mbabane, Swaziland - Four out of every 10 pregnant Swazi women who visited clinics and hospitals last year tested HIV positive, the HIV Seventh Sentinel Sero-surveillance report said. According to a joint report issued by the Swaziland National AIDS/STDS programme and the WHO, said this represents a 34.2 percent preval
Nairobi, Kenya - Even as AIDS continues to kill an average 20,000 people daily in the developing world, there are no indications that a permanent cure would be found any time soon. While scientists flounder for vaccines, the only alternative remains the use of anti-retroviral drugs, which slow down the progression from
Dakar, Senegal - The latest edition of Senegal s health ministry epidemiological bulletin indicates that the HIV prevalence has reached 14 percent among a group of 212 unregistered prostitutes Dakar, the Senegalese capital. The study was undertaken in 2000 among unregistered sex workers operating in 100 of the 183 bars
Cape Town, South Africa - The Bishop of Johannesburg, Brian Germond, and 30 other people, on Thursday underwent voluntary testing for the HIV as part of a campaign to promote Voluntary Counselling and Testing (VCT) among South Africans. The Anglican Church said it is seeking partnerships with business, government and c
DR Congo Public Health Minister, Mashako Mamba says the high cost of drugs is impeding access to proper medication that could prolong the lives of HIV/AIDS patients. He told a press conference in Kinshasa Wednesday that a key element in efforts to enhance patients access to adequate care was a reduction in the cost of
Niamey, Niger - An international AIDS workshop opened in Niamey Thursday to discuss measures of curbing mother-to-child HIV transmission and the promotion of female condoms. The workshop convened by the Society of Women Against AIDS in Africa (SWAA) will also prepare the agenda for the 8th International SWAA conference
Accra, Ghana - Ghana s Food and Drugs Board (FDB) on Wednesday said research has shown that Always Sanitary Pads used by women are not infected with the HIV/AIDS as claimed by a story circulated on the Internet. Preliminary assessment has indicated that it is free of any bacterial or chemical agents, the FDB said in a
Dakar, Senegal - A four-day congress opens on Sunday in Soweto, the sprawling township near Johannesburg, South Africa to rally support for affordable and equal treatment for everybody living with HIV or AIDS now. South Africa s health minister Dr Manto Tshabalala-Msimang would be among guest speakers at the first Nati
Cape Town, South Africa - South African President Thabo Mbeki on Wednesday said a state of emergency to allow the cheaper supply of HIV/AIDS drugs would not by itself solve the problem of affordable medicines. Responding to questions in Parliament, Mbeki said as far as the government was aware, there was no country tha
Nairobi, Kenya - A project to curb the prevalence of a mother-to-child HIV infection rate in Kenya is on the drawing board, area administrators have revealed. The project, to be known as the Prevention of Maternal to Child Transmission, will be sponsored by the Elizabeth Glaser and the Paediatric AIDS Foundation, two N
Dakar, Senegal - The Dakar-based International Organisation of Consumers (IOC), Monday appealed to the international community to support the South African government in the case it is defending in court against 39 pharmaceutical firms, reports the Senegalese Press Agency (APS). The national and international pharmaceu
Nairobi, Kenya - The medical fraternity has called on the government to invoke Section 95 of the Kenya Industrial properties Act to mandate the local pharmaceutical companies to manufacture anti-HIV/AIDS drugs locally. The Pharmaceutical Society of Kenya chairman, Dr Kamamia Muricha, said at the weekend that locally-ma
Port-louis, Mauritius - Health authorities in Mauritius conceded Monday that four new HIV cases - two of them pregnant women - were detected in the country last January. Dr Renaud Man Sun, coordinator of the HIV/AIDS Unit in Mauritius, said the four, aged between 28 and 30, may have been infected ten years ago. It
Windhoek, Namibia - Namibia may not exist in 20 years to come if the scourge of HIV/AIDS is not dealt with effectively, AIDS campaigner warned. The chairman of the Taskforce for the National HIV/AIDS Media Campaign, Jimmy Amupala gave the warning Saturday at the launch of a youth awareness campasign against AIDS at a p
Nairobi, Kenya - In the face of worldwide controversy over cheap generic drugs, pressure continues to mount on multinational pharmaceutical manufacturers to lower their prices to save the lives of millions who are dying of the pandemic in the developing world. The African region chapter of the International Confederati
Ouagadougou, Burkina - A new sex education programme has been launched to help youths in Burkina Faso . Known as RAS or Responsibility, Love and Sincerity, the programme, was launched Thursday in Gorom-Gorom, 400-km north of Ouagadougou, the Burkina capital. Organised by the Association Solidarity Action Sahel (SAS)
Cape Town, South Africa - The World Health Organization (WHO) has joined forces with AIDS organisations around the world by backing the South African government in its legal struggle with 39 pharmaceutical companies over cheap AIDS medication. The Medicines and Related Substances Control Amendment Act of 1997 proposed
Cape Town, South Africa - National and international organisations on Wednesday welcomed the South African High Court s decision to accept evidence from the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) which represents people living with HIV. Pretoria High Court Judge Bernard Ngoepe on Tuesday gave 39 pharmaceutical companies invol
Mbabane, Swaziland - Swaziland s Finance Minister Majozi Sithole has announced a 3.6 billion Emalangeni government budget for the 2001/2002 fiscal year but daunted the public with the meagre allocation to the fight against HIV/AIDS. Though the budget outlay had a few unexpected inclusions, it did not inspire excitement
Cape Town, South Africa - A landmark legal case between the South African government and 42 pharmaceutical companies over medical legislation was Tuesday put on hold for about six weeks. Pretoria High Court Judge Bernard Ngoepe postponed the case until April 18 to give the companies the opportunity to respond to argume
Cape Town, South Africa - The spotlight on South African medical legislation came under the spotlight in the Pretoria High Court again on Tuesday as the government and 42 pharmaceutical companies resumed their dispute over drug patents and the use of cheaper alternatives. The Medicines and Related Substances Control Am
Johannesburg, South Africa - AIDS activists, trade unions and the ANC were united to protest the lawsuit against the South African government by some 39 international pharmaceutical manufacturers attempting to block its plans to import cheaper anti-AIDS generic drugs, radio and television reported in Johannesburg Sunda
Lagos, Nigeria - After weeks of controversy over the safety of a brand of sanitary pads used in Nigeria, the federal government has pronounced all its variants safe. Contrary to reports of alleged HIV-positive status of Always Ultra brand of sanitary pads given freely to some young Nigerian women by agents of manufactu
Kinshasa, DR Congo - The Democratic Republic of the Congo has an estimated 811,000 orphans whose one or both parents have died of AIDS, according to the country s National AIDS control Programme. In a recent report, the programme said that the pandemic has increased the number of street children in the vast country s u
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 28, 2001
Kinshasa, DR Congo - At least 86 percent of young people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) engaged in unprotected sex before the age of 20, indicates a recent study conducted in rural and urban areas. The assistant director of the National AIDS control programme, Dr. Lepira Dieudonne, revealed these finding
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 28, 2001
Rabat - A workshop updating French-speaking consultants on HIV/AIDS wound up in Rabat Wednesday with UNAIDS deputy director for Africa, Grunitzky Bekele Meskerem, recalling that developing countries account for over 90 per cent of the world s 37 million people living with HIV and AIDS. Meskerem lamented that only a
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 28, 2001
Raphael Tenthani
Blantyre - Commander of the Malawi Army, Gen. Joseph Chimbayo, Wednesday admitted that AIDS has devastated the country s military, killing many of his soldiers. Chimbayo s remarks coincided with the publication of a new report by the London-based PANOS Institute which says Malawi s most important public services, inclu
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 27, 2001
Nairobi - A court in Eldoret, about 450km west of Nairobi, Kenya is hearing a case of how the brother and sisters of an HIV-positive woman took advantage of her state to swindle her property. Beatrice Wekesa told senior resident magistrate Wasike Wandera that she was unable to pay court fees because her brother and two
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 25, 2001
Sidy Gaye
Tripoli, Libya - The OAU Secretary General and the representative of the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) Saturday called on participants of the 73rd OAU Council of ministers meeting in Tripoli to include the AIDS pandemic in their political statements. Speaking at the opening of the ministerial session, Salim A
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 23, 2001
Banjul, Gambia - About 50 top-level security chiefs in Gambia Friday began two days of sensitisation on sexually transmitted diseases, including the dreaded HIV/AIDS. At the opening of the workshop, World Health Organisation representative in the Gambia, James Nmanza, observed that because of the nature of their job, m
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 23, 2001
Lome - About 60 researchers, doctors, academics and representatives of the civil society and various ministries are attending a four-day workshop in Lome to prepare a national strategic plan to fight HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted infections. Workshop participants will take into account past experiences to reach con
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 22, 2001
Blantyre, Malawi - A new report published in Malawi says that over 50 percent of Malawians do not want to know or reveal their HIV status for fear of stigmatisation and isolation. The report, based on a survey conducted between November and December 2000 by the National AIDS Control Programme, says the majority of Mala
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 22, 2001
Cape Town, South Africa - The South African government has approved the supply of the AIDS drug Diflucan in tablet form, paving the way for its free distribution among AIDS sufferers in the country. Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and the South African Health Department on Wednesday said the approval follows the agreement
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 22, 2001
Libreville, Gabon - UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has called on governments to guarantee a global commitment to intensified and co-ordinated efforts aimed at reversing the spread of the AIDS pandemic, a communiqué issued by the world organisation said Thursday. In the statement, Annan urged governments to intensify a
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 21, 2001
Nairobi, Kenya - NGOs, including Medicins Sans Frontiers, which are concerned about AIDS Wednesday denounced what they termed lack of transparency in multi-national HIV/AIDS drug deal for Third World countries. At a packed media conference in Nairobi, the NGOs also questioned the sincerity of the drug-makers, who in Ma
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 20, 2001
Nairobi - Jolted by attacks from critics, the authorities in Kenya are reportedly pumping up to 15,000 US dollars into newly formed district and constituency control councils to combat HIV/AIDS. Most of the money was said to come from donors, including the United States and Britain. Parliament s committee
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 20, 2001
Dakar, Senegal - Declaring the HIV/AIDS epidemic the most formidable development challenge of our time , United Nations secretary-general Kofi Annan, in a report released Tuesday, called on governments to secure a global commitment for intensified and co-ordinated action. The report has been issued in preparation for t
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 20, 2001
Segun Adeyemi
Lagos - Will an HIV-positive person endanger the life of others by appearing physically to testify in a law court? This is the question a Nigerian woman, dismissed by her employers after being found to be HIV positive in 1995, is asking the country s Court of Appeal to answer. Georgina Ahamefuna s recourse to the highe
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 18, 2001
Banjul, Gambia - As Gambia steps up activities aimed at controlling the spread of HIV/AIDS, Saihou Sabally, a physician in-charge of the STD and HIV/AIDS Unit of the Medical Research Council at Fajara near Banjul, has advocated the sale of condoms in neighbourhood shops throughout the country. If I have my way, I
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 16, 2001
Windhoek, Namibia - Namibia s ministry of health and social services Friday began a house-to-house AIDS counselling, health education and service provision pilot project in the Caprivi, Ohangwena and Oshana regions, which are mostly affected by HIV/AIDS. Deputy health minister, Richard Kamwi made the disclosure, saying
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 16, 2001
Yaounde - The World Bank has loaned Cameroon 50 million US dollars to meet the medical care of 35,000 people confirmed to be living with HIV/AIDS, official sources in Yaounde said on Friday. This loan is repayable in 10 years after a 10-year grace period. The state and local communities are expected to raise an additio
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 16, 2001
Windhoek - Close to one-third of Namibia s 15,000-strong National Defence Force is infected with HIV-AIDS, the government has acknowledged Friday. Namibia s Minister of Defence, Erkki Nghimtina, revealed said that evidence demonstrates a high prevalence of HIV-AIDS among the uniformed men and women than in the civilian
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 16, 2001
Lusaka, Zambia - Zambia s Konkola company plans to go ahead with a clinical testing of thousands of mine workers for HIV/AIDS infection in spite of protests from union leaders and the government. Officials at the Chingola offices of Konkola Copper Mines said Friday, that details had already been finalised for the testi
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 16, 2001
Windhoek, Namibia - Namibia s ministry of health and social services Friday began a house-to-house AIDS counselling, health education and service provision pilot project in the Caprivi, Ohangwena and Oshana regions, which are mostly affected by HIV/AIDS. Deputy health minister, Richard Kamwi made the disclosure, saying
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 15, 2001
Accra - Ghanaian President John Agyekum Kufuor said Thursday that the biggest challenge facing the world s health sector is the HIV/AIDS pandemic. ...HIV/AIDS is crippling national economies and undermining businesses, he noted, in his first State of the nation address to parliament. He said there have been horror stor
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 15, 2001
Dakar, Senegal - AIDS specialists, economists and other scientists and policymakers meeting in Chicago have proposed a blueprint to treat people with HIV/AIDS in African nations hardest-hit by the disease, the Boston Globe newspaper reported. The plan, developed last week in side sessions at the 8th Conference on Ret
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 14, 2001
Banjul, Gambia - A network of Gambian journalists who have teamed up in the campaign against HIV/AIDS was Tuesday launched by Gambia s director of health services, Yankuba Gassama. At the launch Saihou Ceesay, manager of Gambia s AIDS control programme, reminded pressmen of the responsibility to be factual in their rep
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 13, 2001
Abidjan, Cote d Ivoire - The increasing number of AIDS orphans in Cote d Ivoire hampered efforts exerted by the government to curb the dazzling progress of the pandemic in the country. The 2000 statistics on the number of children infected through their parents and the increasing number of cases recorded in schools has
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 13, 2001
Lagos, Nigeria - Mounting a legal battle to assert the efficacy of his suspect preventive and curative vaccines, prominent HIV/AIDS cure claimant Jeremiah Abalaka claims the Nigerian government, which banned the vaccines, is one of his patrons. Abalaka, who sued the Federal Government, Attorney-General of the Federatio
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 13, 2001
Lusaka, Zambia - The recently privatised Konkola Copper Mines (KCM) in Zambia has courted controversy by requesting its workers to voluntarily take HIV tests in a move management said would help in the planning of future operations. The company, in the northern Copperbelt town of Chililabombwe, says it does not want to
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 12, 2001
Blantyre - An Indian phamarceutical company has offered to supply low-cost triple-therapy AIDS drug cocktail to Malawi , a medical source disclosed in Blantyre. The head of mission of Medicines Sans Frontier in Malawi, Mariline Mulemba told journalists that the Indian Company, CIPLA Limited - a major manufacturer of ge
Panafrican News Agency (Dakar) - February 12, 2001
Cape Town, South Africa - Several HIV/AIDS activists Monday demonstrated outside Parliament in Cape Town against the lack of affordable anti-retroviral drugs. Led by Anglican Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane, the group made its way through the streets of Cape Town to Parliament where prominent HIV/AIDS activist Zackie A
Dakar, Senegal - The World Health Organisation (WHO) has welcomed recent reports indicating that combined triple therapy medication for people with HIV infection and AIDS could be made available in Africa for 600 US dollars or less per person a year. The world health body said in a statement Friday that the reduction i
New York, US - An Indian drug manufacturer, Cipla Ltd., has offered to sell AIDS drugs at a considerably lowered price to Doctors Without Borders for its work in Africa, the US media has reported. The New York Times reported Wednesday that Cipla has agreed to sell the generic versions of the triple-therapy drug cocktai
Gobabis, Namibia - The Regional Youth Forum in Gobabis has warned church and traditional leaders to stop fooling people that they can cure AIDS. Speaking Wednesday at the start of a two-day seminar on HIV/AIDS management training, the forum chairman, Solomo Hepundjua said some churches had convinced their followers tha
Accra - A Ghanaian doctor on Tuesday called on health authorities in the country to improve the quality of HIV diagnostic laboratories to ensure that results emanating from the tests are accurate. Dr William Ampofo, an HIV/AIDS Researchers at the Noguchi Memorial Institute of Medical Research in Accra, said such a move
Mbabane - The programme manager of Swaziland s National AIDS Programme, Beatrice Dlamini has lamented that the government was not providing anti-retroviral drugs to AIDS patients nor pregnant mothers to prevent them from transmitting the virus to their unborn babies. She attributed the government s failure to provide t
Libreville - HIV/AIDS cases have gone up from 1.8 percent in 1998-99 to 7.7 percent in Gabon , according to a survey by the National AIDS programme (PNLS). An official told a workshop at Port-Gentil, west of the country that risk groups included bachelors and unemployed people, the Gabonese daily L Union reported Tue
Gaborone - The US-based Harvard AIDS Institute is exploring the possibility of testing a vaccine against the deadly HIV in Botswana , a local newspaper quoted health minister Joy Phumaphi as saying. It said Phumaphi revealed that representatives of the American institute would visit Botswana on 15 February 2001 to disc
Nairobi - As the toll of persons dying of AIDS and those being infected by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) rises daily in Kenya , one legislator has suggested polygamy as a safe way for couples to steer clear of the killer disease. Ramadhan Seif Kajembe, Member of Parliament for Mombasa, was Tuesday quoted by th
Gaborone - Botswana will record its second budget deficit in 18 years in fiscal 2001, because of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, last years floods and the implementation of priority projects, finance and development planning minister Baledzi Gaolathe told parliament in his budget speech Monday. The budget I have presented
Ouagadougou - A three-month campaign aimed at assessing and raising youth awareness in the struggle against HIV/AIDS in schools was launched Sunday in Ouagadougou. Dubbed The Elites , the campaign has been organised under the aegis of the association, Active Youth. It is funded by the Burkina Faso Red Cross wi
Lagos - At least 10 percent of an estimated 10 million people in Nigeria s south-western state of Lagos are infected with the HIV which causes AIDS, according to the state s Commissioner for Health, Leke Pitan. Pitan said in a radio programme at the weekend that the high incidence of HIV infection in the state had led
Banjul - A Gambian Internet outfit, Unique Solutions, plans to boost the country s HIV/AIDS awareness campaign with a musical show advocating abstinence and the use of condoms. Under the theme Abstinence Should Prevail, Condoms Prevent, the crusade is jointly sponsored by the World Health Organisation, the National AID
Blantyre - Malawi s education system has been severely hit by the HIV/AIDS pandemic, said to be claiming at least 600 teachers a year. At the latest meeting on strategies to check the impact of HIV/AIDS, Education Minister George Ntafu said the authorities must step up measures against the scourge. If our education sys
Blantyre - Banja La Mtsogolo, Malawi s leading reproductive health NGO, says it distributed at least seven million condoms in the country in 2000 alone. BLM s programme Director Walker Jiyani, said that during the same period, some 290,862 couples were counselled on how to prevent unprotected pregnancies, while over 11
Maputo - Mozambican Prime Minister Pascoal Mocumbi has warned pupils that AIDS is a lethal disease, but can be prevented. He gave the warning Friday while addressing about 600 pupils along with their parents and teachers in Maputo at a ceremony marking the start of academic 2001. Mocumbi said the slogan for the inaugur
Saint Louis - In a pathetic case of self-pity, a former sugar company laboratory analyst in Senegal s city of Saint Louis, has narrated how he acquired the HIV virus that causes AIDS. Mabeye, 41, who requested the use of only his first name, said he got the HIV-2 type virus through extra-marital sex while working at th
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia - Wife inheritance has been cited among traditional practices contributing to the spread of HIV/AIDS in Ethiopia s south western Gambella region. Hawiyta Awili, head of Gambella s Women Affairs Bureau was quoted by the local press as saying that the tradition of inheriting wives of deceased family
Lagos, Nigeria - A number of Western experts have hailed the Nigerian HIV/AIDS vaccine strategy initiative as a right step at confronting the scourge. I have been in development workshops like this since the beginning of the epidemic, and this is one of the best I have attended, said Edmund Tramont, a Professor and As
Windhoek, Namibia - Namibian President Sam Nujoma has said the HIV/AIDS pandemic has reached catastrophic proportions requiring the intervention of the international community. He particularly appealed for assistance to enable poor countries purchase the costly life-prolonging antiretrovirals currently available for pa
Gaborone - Botswana is reputed to have the highest HIV/AIDS infection rates in the world, and as the epidemic takes its toll, the country s morgues are increasingly having difficulties in coping with the casualties. So bad is the situation that at the country s premier health institution - Princes Marina Hospital - cor
Dakar, Senegal - Senegalese Foreign Minister Cheick Tidiane Gadio Sunday night challenged Africans to mobilise all available resources and surge against HIV/AIDS to stop the pandemic from debilitating the continent s development potential. Africans have the responsibility and must first count on their own resources bef
BANJUL - Five people died of AIDS in Gambia this week, Roseclair Charles, the co-ordinator of the Santa Yalla Support Group, a 62-member association of people living with the disease, has said. Roseclair, who was addressing staff members of the Trust Bank in the Gambian capital, Banjul Thursday, said, I am just coming
WINDHOEK, NAMIBIA - Recognising that the HIV/AIDS pandemic has reached catastrophic proportions in Africa, President Sam Nujoma is appealing to the West for help in procuring expensive medication, which he said, was well beyond the reach of HIV/AIDS patients in Africa. Addressing diplomatic representatives in Windhoek,
PORT LOUIS, MAURITIUS - In a move to intensify an awareness campaign against HIV/AIDS in Mauritius , the AIDS Unit in the health ministry in Port Louis has set up a telephone hotline to provide the public with information on the pandemic. It has published special telephone numbers, which the public can call between 09H
CHIREDZI, ZIMBABWE - On the surface, James Sibanda is like any other ordinary high school student - full of sweet dreams and fantasies about his working life ahead. But increasingly, the 17-year-old boy from this small sugar cane-growing Zimbabwean town, is losing hope of ever pursuing his dream engineering career foll
NAIROBI, KENYA - Researchers from US-based John Hopkins University working in Nairobi have warned of potential spread of AIDS among Kenya s adolescent population. The researchers fear the scourge, now in its third stage, could afflict more than 40 percent of children aged between 13 and 19 years. The first stage involv
New York, UN - UNAIDS executive director Peter Piot Friday said there has been a remarkable increase in global resolve to tackle HIV/AIDS since 2000, even though the epidemic equally surged during the year. Addressing a Security Council session to review implementation of its July 2000 resolution calling for increased
BANJUL, GAMBIA - The manager of the National AIDS Control Programme in Gambia , Saihou Ceesay Friday said HIV/AIDS prevalence rate in the country is still low. He said in spite of uncertainty expressed in some quarters over the authenticity of the official figures put at 3,000 of people living with the virus, Gambia st
Speakers at a seminar on Gender and Poverty Dimensions of HIV/AIDS held Wednesday in the Gambian capital of Banjul have raised doubts over the official number of people living with HIV/AIDS in Gambia which has been put at 3000. Siga Fatima Jagne, executive director of the Women s Bureau, said the country s HIV/AIDS sta
ACCRA, GHANA - Ghanaian health authorities have taken a major step to resolve a seemingly contentious issue in the fight against HIV/AIDS in the country by seeking to encourage traditional medical practitioners. For many people in the West African country, where about 60 percent of the population lives in the rural are
CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA - The condition of 11-year- old AIDS sufferer and activist, Nkosi Johnson, has improved slightly, two weeks after he slipped into a coma after suffering a series of seizures. Nkosi s foster mother, Gail Johnson, said he managed to take in food orally for the first time on Wednesday although he i
ACCRA - Ghana , faced with several claims of AIDS cure from herbalists, is trying to develop guidelines for testing traditional medical products on HIV/AIDS. The two-day meeting of experts, including scientists, traditional medicine practitioners and officials of the Ministry of Health, began a meeting in Accra on Tues
DAKAR, SENEGAL - A UN General Assembly special session slated for 25-27 June 2001 on HIV/AIDS in New York is to review problems associated with the pandemic and secure a global commitment to combat it. According a UN release, member States are expected during the session to agree on a declaration that will strengthen p
NAIROBI, KENYA - US-based World Vision International has committed over 30 million US dollars to fight HIV/AIDS in Kenya , an official has said. Dean Hirsch, President of the American charitable organisation, said in Nairobi late Tuesday that the campaign against the killer disease would be carried out through its HOP
CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA - President Thabo Mbeki is facing growing pressure for not visiting the country s youngest AIDS activist, 11-year-old Nkosi Johnson, who is fighting for his life a week after he slipped into a coma after suffering a series of seizures. The young boy who has touched the hearts of millions of peop
LUSAKA, ZAMBIA - Society for Family Health, one of the companies in Zambia charged with marketing maximum condoms, says the response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the country should be one that is based on truth, respect for scientific facts and the different approaches to the HIV/AIDS prevention. The remarks follow
CAPE TOWN - The condition of 11-year- old AIDS activist, Nkosi Johnson, remained unchanged Friday, five days after he slipped into a coma after suffering a series of seizures. Nkosi s mother, Gail Johnson, said he was still in a critical condition and was not responding to people around him. Hundreds of people attended
ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA - The death toll from AIDS in Ethiopia will reach 460 people per day by 2004 unless the prevailing alarming rapid spread of the pandemic is checked substantially, says a Health Ministry publication called AIDS In Ethiopia. The projection by the ministry s Disease Prevention and Control Department
BANJUL, GAMBIA - Gambia s reigning beauty queen, 19-year-old Astou Njie will shortly launch a HIV/AIDS initiative in the country, her manager disclosed in Banjul Thursday. The manager, Mama Sarr, a staff of the Fajara-based Medical Research Council, said Astou is concerned about the welfare of people living with HIV/AI
KINSHASA, DR CONGO - At least 160,000 workers died of AIDS in the war-ravaged eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo between 1998 and 2000, according to statistics issued by the Kinshasa office of the World Health Organisation. The office quoted statistics issued by the DRC National AIDS Control Programme, which indi
CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA - Recent reports about the toxicity of the AIDS drug Nevirapine will have no impact on the Democratic Alliance s plans to provide the medicine free to HIV-positive pregnant women in the party s controlled municipalities. Party spokesman Sandy Kalyan said reports of Nevirapine being potentially h
Dakar, Senegal (PANA) - About half a million people in Burkina Faso , close to 10 percent of adults, are infected with HIV/AIDS, according to Burkina Faso Human Development Report 2001, prepared with support of the UN Development Programme. This makes the west African nation one of the worst hit countries in the worl
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