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HIV among older South Africans in rural areas: big study shows there’s a problem that’s being neglected

HIV among older South Africans in rural areas: big study shows there’s a problem that’s being neglected

SOUTH Africa continues to have a high prevalence of HIV among all age groups. About 8.2 million people or 13.7% of the population live with HIV, one of the highest rates in the world. The country also has one of the world’s most impressive antiretroviral therapy programmes. Over 5 million people living with HIV are currently on chronic treatment. Widespread access to antiretroviral therapies since 2008 has led to millions of people ageing with chronic HIV infection. Consequently, people with HIV are older on average than they were just a decade ago. Most HIV prevention and treatment programmes and policies…
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HIV prevention: new injection could boost the fight, but some hurdles remain

HIV prevention: new injection could boost the fight, but some hurdles remain

WHILE the world has focused on the COVID pandemic for nearly three years, less and less attention is being paid to HIV. However, HIV is still a global problem. In 2021, according to the United Nations, 38.4 million people were living with HIV, over 650,000 died from AIDS-related illnesses, and 1.5 million became newly infected. Nearly 70% of infections occur in key groups: sex workers and their clients, men who have sex with men, people who inject drugs, and transgender people and their sexual partners. Adolescent girls and young women in sub-Saharan Africa are another important group, with nearly 5,000…
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OPINION: Forty years of AIDS – Justice and equality remain key to quelling a still-potent epidemic

OPINION: Forty years of AIDS – Justice and equality remain key to quelling a still-potent epidemic

EDWIN CAMERON TODAY, marks World AIDS Day. The past four decades have yielded enormous medical and scientific progress – but death and stigma remain. Many elude testing or die in shame, treatment does not reach all who need it, and inequality impedes our global response. I can write this because life unexpectedly afforded me survival from AIDS. Around Easter 1985, I became infected with HIV. There was no treatment: HIV meant certain death. Like many, I kept my HIV status a secret. I hoped to escape death. No. Twelve years later, AIDS felled my body. I became terribly ill. But my privileges…
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HIV generic drug for babies distributed in Africa, says UNITAID

HIV generic drug for babies distributed in Africa, says UNITAID

AID agencies have distributed a strawberry-flavoured tablet for children living with HIV in six African countries, the first generic pediatric version of a key anti-retroviral, according to the global health agency UNITAID. UNITAID and Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) funding procured 100,000 packs of the dolutegravir formulation across Nigeria, Malawi, Uganda, Kenya, Zimbabwe and Benin, UNITAD's spokesman Herve Verhoosel said in a statement to Reuters. Some 1.8 million children worldwide live with HIV, but only half receive any treatment, often hard to administer due to the bitter taste or incorrectly dosed by crushing adult pills. Some 100,000 children die of…
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Ending HIV in children is way off target: where to focus action now

Ending HIV in children is way off target: where to focus action now

WORLD leaders have recently, under the auspices of the United Nations, renewed their commitment to ending AIDS. The new phase offers much-needed hope for the future, provided the commitments made are fulfilled. KAYMARLIN GOVENDER, Research Director at The Health Economics and HIV and AIDS Research Division (HEARD), University of KwaZulu-Natal LINDA-GAIL BEKKER, Professor of medicine and deputy director of the Desmond Tutu HIV Centre at the Institute of Infectious Disease and Molecular Medicine, University of Cape Town The adopted political declaration and its recommendations offer strategies for ending mother-to-child transmission of HIV and paediatric AIDS. They also address inequalities faced…
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Here’s where efforts to end HIV in eastern and southern Africa must focus

Here’s where efforts to end HIV in eastern and southern Africa must focus

THE World AIDS Day commemoration of 2020 took place in the midst of a global pandemic. It served as another reminder that people are not only susceptible to pathogens, but to the political, social and economic inequities that determine vulnerability to infections. KAYMARLIN GOVENDER, Research Director at The Health Economics and HIV and AIDS Research Division (HEARD), University of KwaZulu-Natal JANET SEELEY, Professor of Anthropology and Health, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine MITZY GAFOS, Associate Professor in the department of Global Health and Development , London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine ROSELYN KANYEMBA, Post-doctoral reseacher, University of…
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Dignity at the end of life: a Malawian nursing study shows the impact of food

Dignity at the end of life: a Malawian nursing study shows the impact of food

WORLD hunger has risen for the third year in a row, with Africa reported to have the highest rate of undernourishment of all regions globally. Africa also bears the greatest burden of HIV, which is linked to food insecurity, and women are disproportionately affected by HIV and food insecurity compared to men. ELIZABETH MKANDAWIRE, Network and Research Manager: ARUA – UKRI GCRF FSNet Africa, University of Pretoria ANNE DRESSEL, Assistant Professor of Global Health, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee LUCY MKANDAWIRE-VALHMU, Associate professor, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, College of Nursing PENINNAH KAKO, PhD, RN, FNP-BC, Associate Professor, College of Nursing, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee…
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Millions of people are on treatment for HIV: why are so many still dying?

Millions of people are on treatment for HIV: why are so many still dying?

TWENTY years ago treatment for HIV was a rare luxury in South Africa. Exorbitant costs and President Thabo Mbeki’s government’s fierce opposition to providing antiretroviral treatment (ART) kept it out of the public sector. GILLES VAN CUTSEM, Honorary Research Associate, Centre for Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Research, University of Cape Town They were terrible days. Many lives were lost. The environment has changed remarkably since then. The turning point came in 2004 when, after four years of struggle, led by the Treatment Action Campaign, the government begrudgingly agreed to start providing ART. Antiretroviral coverage of people with HIV in South…
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‘Corona carriers’: Stigma halts medication and meet-ups for HIV+ Malawians

‘Corona carriers’: Stigma halts medication and meet-ups for HIV+ Malawians

CHARLES PENSULO  MALAWIAN student Kondwani has fought against the stigma of being HIV-positive for most of his life, but COVID-19 has reignited old prejudices and given rise to a new term of abuse - "corona carrier". A widely held misconception that HIV-positive people are at high risk of catching the coronavirus is fueling discrimination and making it harder for them to access the medical care they need, health activists in the southern African country said. Kondwani, 24, said it was also spreading anxiety among the 1.1 million people who live with HIV in Malawi - which has one of the…
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Zambian study points to why some mothers don’t carry on taking HIV drugs

Zambian study points to why some mothers don’t carry on taking HIV drugs

JERRY JOHN NUTOR, Assistant Professor, Family Health Care Nursing, University of California, San Francisco THERE are more than 85,000 children living with HIV in Zambia. The primary source of infection is from mother to child during pregnancy, childbirth or breastfeeding. Antiretroviral therapy (ART) is an effective strategy to eliminate these new infections. But it only works if women take their medications consistently. Adherence to ART is still a major challenge in sub-Saharan Africa, especially among pregnant and breastfeeding women. In 2012, the World Health Organisation (WHO) introduced new guidelines for the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV. Women with HIV…
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