News (Updated February 19,
2006)
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AIDS surpassed hepatitis B to become China's third-deadliest infectious
disease last year, the government said Monday.
Tuberculosis was the country's No. 1 infectious killer in 2005, followed by
rabies, the official Xinhua News Agency said, citing a Health Ministry report.
Hepatitis B followed by tetanus in newborn babies were the fourth and fifth
biggest killers.
The death rate from the deadliest infectious diseases rose by 83.3 percent
last year from 2004, Xinhua said. It gave no other details or a possible reason
for the sudden increase.
Xinhua said the top five deadliest infectious diseases killed 13,185 people
in 2005.
The figures, however, conflict with a report released last month by the
Health Ministry, the World Health Organization and the United Nations that said
about 25,000 people died of AIDS alone last year in China.
The Xinhua report Monday gave no breakdown of how many people died of each
disease. But it said 4.42 million cases of infectious disease were reported last
year.
According to the January joint report, 70,000 people contracted HIV in China
last year, most of whom were injecting drug users and sex workers. There were an
estimated 650,000 people living with HIV and 75,000 with full-blown AIDS at the
end of 2005, according to the report.
China had estimated in 2003 that 840,000 people had HIV and 84,000 had
full-blown AIDS.
International experts said that the lower numbers did not indicate the
disease was any less of a threat.
"You shouldn't read these numbers and say, 'Oh, these are small
numbers,'" said Michel Beusenberg, a WHO spokesman in Geneva.
Estimates of the number of people in China with HIV or AIDS are based on
studies of high-risk populations such as drug users, and might be different from
the true figures, he said.
What experts have also said is worrying is the small but growing number of
HIV infections among the general public, mostly spouses of the clients of sex
workers.
If it spreads beyond that, the results could be devastating, Beusenberg said.
"You can imagine what the impact would be if it makes that jump,"
he said.
Hong Kong registered a
record number of 313 HIV cases in 2005, a rise of 17 percent from 2004 as
sexual transmission continues to be the major mode of HIV spread, a health
official said.
Raymond Ho, the health department's senior medical officer, said over
two-thirds of the people were infected via sexual contacts with 30.7 percent
of them reported by homosexuals.
Eight percent were infected through needle-sharing in drug use and 1.3
percent through blood infusion.
The department also revealed a cluster of 20 HIV cases shown to have
similar gene sequencing between November 2003 and November 2005. Preliminary
investigation showed these cases might be linked and happened in the gay
community.
"Those affected were believed to have had multiple sex partners and
participated in sex activities arranged through the Internet," a
spokesman for the department said on Tuesday, urging people to use condoms
for safer sex.
Some 22 new cases of AIDS were recorded during the fourth quarter of
2005, bringing to 782 the total number of confirmed AIDS cases reported
since 1985.
Sun Feb 19, 2006 12:43 PM ET
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Former President Bill Clinton and the Indian government
announced on Sunday a joint plan to train nurses in AIDS care in a country which
has the world's second-largest number of HIV/AIDS cases.
Of India's billion plus people, more than 5.1 million are living with
HIV/AIDS, making it the second-worst affected nation after South Africa.
The plan, a partnership between National AIDS Control Organization of India (NACO)
and the Clinton Foundation, aims to develop training material and program for
nurses, a news release by the Foundation said.
"Nurses are a critical link in the delivery of care and treatment for
people living with HIV," said Clinton, who visited the All India Institute
of Medical Sciences, the country's top hospital.
"Nurses not only deliver clinical care needed to keep people alive, but
they also act as counselors and play an important role in reducing the myths,
stigma & discrimination surrounding this disease," the former president
added.
Last month, Clinton announced an initiative with nine drug companies he said
would cut the cost of HIV/AIDS testing and treatment in 50 developing countries
and help save hundreds of thousands of lives.
Tuesday February 14, 01:05 PM
BANGKOK (AFP) -
Thailand plans to halve new HIV infections within three years as part of Asia
Pacific efforts to combat the HIV/AIDS pandemic.
"Thailand will move ahead with a strategic aim to strengthen our
prevention programmes and to reduce annual new infections by half within three
years," Thai vice minister for public health, Professor Arun Pausawasdi,
said on Tuesday.
"We do anticipate that the number of new HIV infections in 2008 will
be 7,500 cases (against 15,000 new cases reported in 2005) and thus, in 2010,
there will be no more than 6,000 cases.
More than one million people in Thailand have become infected with HIV, the
virus which causes AIDS, since the first case was reported here 22 years ago,
the Thai government said in July.
About half a million have died and some 500,000 people are living with
HIV/AIDS in the kingdom.
Thailand responded swiftly to the disease in the late 1980s after a period
of denial, but experts warned in 2004 that it had lost its momentum in the
AIDS fight.
"For the treatment programme, the government has already declared a
universal coverage policy on anti-retroviral treatment for HIV and AIDS
patients" who meet the necessary criteria, Arun said.
He was speaking at a three-day HIV/AIDS meeting of health officials from 22
countries in the southeastern resort city of Pattaya.
Michel Sidibe, director of country and regional support for the United
Nations' joint programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) said many barriers remained
toward the UN's goal of access to treatment by 2010 for those who need it.
"Accessibility to information for young people and issues related to
discrimination are the major challenges this region is facing," Sidibe
told AFP.
"They also include issues of immigration and migration, men having sex
with men and sex workers -- these groups have a major challenge to be
reached," he said.
A UN report published in November on progress in the AIDS fight said
Thailand's national adult HIV prevalence rate in 2003 fell to a record low of
1.5 percent, but noted only 51 percent of Thai sex workers reported using
condoms.
DAR ES SALAAM (Reuters) - Bird flu poses a major threat to Africa's fight
against its AIDS epidemic, challenging overburdened healthcare systems and
stretching economies already hit by the impact of HIV, the U.N.'s AIDS chief
said.
UNAIDS Executive Director Peter Piot said a human outbreak of bird flu in
Africa - where the deadly H5N1 strain of the virus was detected in poultry in
Nigeria this month - could be a massive blow to the campaign to rein in AIDS.
"We are on very thin ice here," Piot told Reuters in Dar es Salaam,
where he was on an inspection mission.
"AIDS has made a mess of Africa's health care systems, and none of the
factors that created the AIDS disaster have gone away. But with bird flu, we
could be looking at things getting worse in a matter of months, not
decades."
Cases of H5N1 have been confirmed on four farms in the northern Nigerian
states of Kano and Kaduna and in the central state of Plateau. There have been
suspected outbreaks in at least five other states in the centre or north of the
country.
No human bird flu case has been found in Africa so far. But detecting such a
case will be difficult because mortality rates are high from other diseases and
health services are almost non-existent in rural areas, where people are often
buried without a medical check.
Officials are now increasingly worried the likelihood of human transmission
could rise if the virus spreads to other countries in the region -- many already
suffering from widespread malnutrition, poverty and the effects of the world's
worst HIV/AIDS pandemic.
"Africa is fragile, and this could really overburden its systems,"
Piot said.
"We have not seen a human outbreak yet. But if we do, the resources are
going to have to come from somewhere. That is a real concern for everybody
involved in development."
VIRAL INTERACTION
Piot said scientists were studying the possible interaction of bird flu and
HIV, the virus which causes AIDS and which has already infected some 26 million
people in sub-Saharan Africa.
While some theorise that those whose immune systems are weakened by HIV might
die faster in a bird flu outbreak, others say that because bird flu
overstimulates the immune response, HIV-positive people might not die themselves
but instead become "supercarriers" that spread the virus.
Piot said precautionary measures such as poultry culls could spell disaster
in their own right on a continent where many people survive on subsistence
farming and keep chickens to feed their families.
"For many people in Africa, chicken is either the major source of
protein or the major source of income. If we try to eliminate chickens it would
be an economic catastrophe, and that has clear implications for AIDS," he
said.
Piot -- who has spent a decade at the helm of the U.N.'s AIDS effort -- said
he was encouraged by the rapid global response to the bird flu threat but that
much more needed to be done both to organise an effective response.
"The first lesson from AIDS is to act early and not to wait until you've
got a big problem," he said. "That's what happened with AIDS in
Africa, and look at the impact now."
19 Feb 2006 08:23:36 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Krittivas Mukherjee
MUMBAI, Feb 19 (Reuters) - A Bollywood film about a single mother and her
young son's struggle to live with HIV/AIDS opened in cinemas across India last
week, marking the first foray by the Indian Catholic church into commercial
cinema.
The Hindi-language 'Aisa Kyun Hota Hai' (Why Does This Happen?) is made with
church money and it is hoped it will spread awareness about HIV/AIDS among
India's 1.1 billion people of whom more than 5.1 million are living with the
deadly virus.
That makes India the second worst affected nation after South Africa.
"The film's message is that today's youngsters should delay their sexual
debut, practice safe sex and be loyal in their relationships and not be
prejudiced against other faiths," said Reverend Dominic Emmanuel, the
film's executive producer and a spokesman for the Catholic diocese in New Delhi.
The church production also focuses on religious harmony in a pluralistic
India.
"We decided to use popular Bollywood cinema to get across our message
because that way it reaches the maximum number of people," Emmanuel said.
The film, so far, has had a lukewarm response from the public, but its
producers say they hope to do well in the country's east and northeast, which
account for the bulk of India's almost two percent Christian population.
The film has songs and dances and is high on melodrama as a rebellious son
seeks to earn money and respect for his mother -- whose husband left her -- but
ends up paying for his sexual indiscretions and infects his girlfriend with HIV.
Former Bollywood leading lady Rati Agnihotri plays the mother in the 20
million rupees ($440,000) film that also has in its cast several young and
lesser-known actors.
"How many people attend church? For social messages to get to the masses
a medium like Bollywood has to be used effectively," said Father C.M. Paul,
a Catholic priest in the eastern city of Kolkata.
Until now, the church in India made social documentaries watched only by a
small number of diligent church-goers, Paul said.
Recent Bollywood films such as 'My Brother Nikhil' and 'Phir Milenge' (We
will meet again) have tackled the issue of HIV/AIDS in a new trend that critics
call campaign cinema.
Though there has been an explosion of sexually explicit movies,
advertisements and music videos in India in the past five years, most people do
not discuss sex or the dangers of HIV/AIDS openly.
"Contemporary mainstream cinema mostly stayed away from making movies
with a social message simply because the larger audience wants entertainment and
films that reflect their aspirations and dreams," said film critic Deepa
Gehlot. ($1 = 44.47 rupees)
17 Feb 2006 13:19:17 GMT
Source: Reuters
NAIROBI, Feb 17 (Reuters) - The United States will spend more than $208
million to prevent new HIV infections and provide life-prolonging AIDS drugs in
Kenya in 2006, its embassy in Nairobi said on Friday.
The funding aims to prevent 32,000 new-born babies from being infected with the
AIDS virus and also expand Kenya's capacity for safe blood supply, the embassy
said in a statement.
HIV/AIDS prevalence in the east African country has declined to 7 percent in
2003 from about 10 percent in the late 1990s.
The new U.S. funding takes place under President George W. Bush's Emergency
Plan for Aids Relief, the embassy said.
"More then half ... will support continued rapid expansion of
anti-retroviral (ARV) treatment nationwide through a process that currently
supports nearly 35,000 Kenyans with ARVs," the statement said.
Thousands of Kenyans living with the virus cannot access even the cheapest
ARV drugs, which are too expensive in private hospitals and not available in
public ones.
The U.N.'s AIDS agency estimates 26 million of the 40 million people infected
with HIV worldwide live in Africa. The continent accounts for about 3.2 million
of the almost 5 million new infections recorded globally in 2005.
Thu Feb 16, 2006 01:19 PM ET
CAPE TOWN (Reuters) - A South African man was jailed for life on Thursday for
raping an AIDS activist and beating her to death after she told him she was HIV
positive.
Lorna Mlosana, a trainee educator with the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC),
South Africa's largest AIDS lobby group, was raped in the outside toilet of a
bar in Khayelitsha township, near Cape Town, in December 2003.
Her attacker, Ncedile Ntumbukane, then beat her to death in fury when she
revealed she had HIV.
Ntumbukane "was sentenced to life in prison for murder," the TAC
said in a statement.
The Cape High Court also handed Ntumbukane an additional 10 years for rape,
while his woman co-accused, Vuyelwa Dlova, who had kicked and punched Mlosana,
was given a 10-year sentence for assault.
Activists in South Africa -- which has the world's highest number of HIV/AIDS
cases with an estimated one in nine of its 45 million people infected -- say the
stigma associated with the killer disease is hampering efforts to fight it.
In 1998, South African AIDS activist Gugu Dlamini was killed by a mob after
revealing on television she was infected with HIV.
The country's former president Nelson Mandela was praised by activists last
year when he announced that his only surviving son, Makgatho Mandela, had died
of an AIDS-related illness at the age of 54.
13 Feb 2006 19:50:02 GMT
Source: IRIN
MBABANE, 13 February (IRIN) - The web page is as brightly coloured as a
primary school text book, but the images conjure the anxiety of abandonment and
uncertainty that any child would feel at the loss of their parents.
"Imagine that you're 12 years old. Your father died five years ago. Two
years ago, your mother got sick. You left school to help tend to her, and to
care for your little brothers and sisters. You've tried to grow corn on your
family land, but there's a drought and you haven't learned enough yet to be a
good farmer. Now, your mother has died, too. In the midst of your grief and your
fear for the future, questions keep you awake at night: What will happen to us
now? How will we live?"
With this introduction, aimed at young people in the developed world, the
first internet-based intervention highlighting Swaziland's humanitarian crisis
went online this week.
'Young Heroes', [www.youngheroes.org.sz], an initiative by the National
Emergency Council on HIV/AIDS (NERCHA), seeks to inspire teenagers in the
affluent West to sponsor orphans in a nation where two-thirds of the population
lives in chronic poverty.
"The Young Heroes objective is to motivate young people overseas, both
as individuals and in groups like schools and churches, to help orphan families
through monthly donations for basic necessities such as food and clothing,"
said Nana Mdluli, NERCHA's public relations officer.
"Unlike other programmes aimed at orphans, our goal is to offer sponsors
the opportunity to keep families together on their homesteads and in their
communities. So, instead of supporting one individual child, a contribution goes
towards helping an entire family meet its basic needs."
NERCHA, which distributes monies from government, the private sector and the
Geneva-based Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, is using
cyberspace to draw attention to a tragic consequence of Swaziland's AIDS
dilemma. With over 40 percent of adults HIV-positive, an upsurge in deaths from
AIDS-related illnesses is expanding the population of orphans beyond the coping
capacity of the country's traditional family structures.
"Swaziland now has nearly 70,000 AIDS orphans, who struggle every day
for the bare necessities of life. The number of these young heroes is growing
daily. Already, over 15,000 households in the country are headed by children,
who are trying to raise their little brothers and sisters by themselves,"
the website notes.
A former American Peace Corps volunteer in Swaziland, Steve Kallaugher, is
the project supervisor. "We are motivating young people in the West to
spread word about this site. That is more important than financial donations at
this time. We want people to get the site printed in church newsletters, school
newspapers, and get people talking about it," he said.
Illustrated with photographs of Swaziland's extraordinary beauty, juxtaposed
with images of raggedy orphans in their meagre housing, the site explains why a
Swazi AIDS orphan is better served growing up in the familiar surroundings of
his or her community than being institutionalised in a charitable facility, of
which Swaziland has few, in any case.
Illustrated 'mini-autobiographies' allow three AIDS orphans to tell of their
own lives, fears and hopes, connecting dramatically and intimately with the
website reader.
One page lists dozens of rural Swazi communities, with a corresponding number
of child-headed households that require support. Readers who might be familiar
with the country's outsized AIDS problem would be surprised at how few families
are listed. Siteki, the provincial capital of the eastern Lubombo Region, an
area hard-hit by AIDS, is reported to have only two child-headed households in
need.
"For every family listed, there are many more who require sponsorship.
But as a new project, we are starting at a manageable level. We need to track
the donations to the families for the sponsors. Every family who receives aid
will be replaced on the website by a new family," said Kallaugher.
All the listed families were "found" by Peace Corps volunteers
living and working in Swaziland's rural communities, government health
motivators and schoolteachers. The neighbours of children who have been living
alone since the death of their parents, and traditional authorities like chiefs
also contributed information.
"There's an old saying that 'there are no orphans in Africa'. With the
tradition of the extended family there was always someone to take in and care
for a child - an uncle, a cousin, even a neighbour. But the toll of AIDS is
growing so heavy in Swaziland that it's no longer true. Families are losing more
and more adults, so there are fewer left to care for the orphans left behind.
The extended family structure is breaking down, and the children are the
victims," the website explains.
The worst is yet to come, and the site is candid about it. The number of AIDS
orphans in need is expected to nearly double, to 120,000, by 2010, when the
population of children who have lost both parents to AIDS will comprise about 12
percent of Swaziland's population of one million.
A group of HIV-positive Libyan children at the centre of the case of five
Bulgarian nurses detained over their infection are to be sent to France for
treatment, officials said.
The new development in the controversial and long-running saga follows a
December 25 verdict by the Libyan supreme court overturning death sentences
and ordering a new trial for the Bulgarians and a Palestinian doctor.
An international fund to help the HIV-infected Libyan children was set up
at the end of January, but its value has still yet to be agreed in talks
between representatives of the families and Western officials.
"The discussions have been positive, action has been taken at an
international level to offer adequate services to the children in Libya and
abroad," said Saleh Abdel Salam, a director of the Kadhafi Foundation.
"A first group of 30 children will go to France on February 27"
for treatment, he told AFP.
Families of the victims are seeking a total of around 4.3 billion euros
in what they see as compensation, a definition rejected by Bulgaria which
says the nurses are not guilty of infecting the children.
The EU ambassador in Libya, Mark Pierini, said the discussions on the
fund would resume on March 13 but would need to last for several weeks.
The spokesman for the victims' families, Idriss Lagha, said they were
maintaining a demand of 10 million euros in compensation for each of the
victims' families.
The six were originally condemned to death after being found guilty by a
court of transfusing 426 Libyan children with blood contaminated with the
AIDS virus in a Benghazi hospital. Fifty-one of the children have since
died.
By BRUCE MUTSVAIRO, Associated Press WriterSat Feb 18, 11:36 PM ET
Dutch prostitutes gave the public a peek behind the curtains of
Amsterdam's famed Red Light District on Saturday, hoping to stave off an
attempt by city politicians to stop lingerie-clad women from advertising
themselves in neon-lit windows.
Thousands of tourists and Dutch visitors took up the offer by the
district's sex clubs and topless bars to step in for a free drink and a look
around to counteract the establishments' seedy reputation.
Women allowed visitors into the cubicles where they conduct their
business to explain hygiene regulations and the alarm system used when a
prostitute encounters a difficult customer.
"The Red Light district has received a lot of negative publicity
recently," said organizer Mariska Majoor, an ex-prostitute who runs the
district's Prostitution Information Center. "We want to show the world
that it is safe out here."
The open house came in response to proposals by the head of Amsterdam's
Labor Party, the city's largest party, to discourage women from marketing
themselves in windows.
The intimately lit rooms were sparse, with just a bed, a bedside table
and a shower.
A young woman showing a room to a group of five men said customers are
immediately offered condoms and asked if they want to shower before their
15-minute session, which normally costs $60.
"You would not expect to find something like this in conservative
Cambridge," British tourist Leigh Shaw-Taylor said after wandering past
sex clubs and shops selling sex toys.
In a book released a few months ago, Labor party leader Lodewijk Asscher
urged the authorities to crack down on window prostitution, saying it
fostered crime and attracted pimps, drug addicts and human traffickers.
A recent study found that despite health rules, about 7 percent of Dutch
prostitutes have HIV/AIDS.
"You must draw a line between tolerance and disinterest,"
Asscher wrote on his Web log. "Tolerance means legalizing prostitution,
but then you must also be ready to combat the problems associated with
it."
Local authorities already have closed down the red-light district in the
eastern town of Arnhem.
The open house idea was supported by the information center, Amsterdam's
Sex Museum, and the Salvation Army, which is active in the area.
Majoor said not all the sex workers were happy about opening their
business premises to gawking, photograph-taking tourists.
"I completely understand their anger, she said. She said she hoped
the women would see the intention was not to "humiliate, but promote
their work."
Prostitution in Amsterdam boomed during the city's 17th century Golden
Age, when women catered to sailors from merchant ships in what was then the
world's richest port city.
The area in the city center became a major tourist draw in the 20th
century. The Dutch government legalized prostitution in 2000 with an eye to
making it easier to tax and regulate.
|
|
| Sir Elton John's is the
highest-profile civil partnership so far |
Rates of depression, drug abuse and cancer are higher in the gay community
than among heterosexual people.
The report said civil partnerships, which were introduced in England and
Wales in December, were likely to reduce prejudice and social exclusion.
The Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health article was based on
previous studies in other countries.
Denmark was the first country to introduce civil partnerships for same sex
couples in 1989, since when several European Union countries, some US states,
Australia and Canada have followed suit.
Professor Michael King, of University College London, who co-wrote the
article, said: "Civil partnerships are likely to break down some of the
prejudice and promote greater understanding, including among staff working
in the health service.
"Legal civil partnerships could increase the stability of same sex
relationships and minimise the social exclusion to which gay and lesbian
people are often subjected."
Research has shown that lesbians have higher risk of breast cancer, heart
disease and obesity, while gay men have a higher risk of HIV, the article
said.
Gay people are also more likely to suffer from depression, drug abuse and
suicidal urges than heterosexual people.
Stable
And the report said studies had shown those who are in a stable
relationship, of either the same or opposite sex, enjoyed some health
benefits.
It cited Swiss research which showed patients with HIV in stable
partnerships were more likely to progress more slowly to Aids.
And other studies have revealed that married same sex couples had greater
openness about their sexual orientation and closer relationships with their
relatives than same sex couples not in civil partnerships.
But the doctors in the latest study added further research was needed to
prove the theory.
Andy Forrest, of Stonewall gay rights campaign group, said the report was
"logical" but it would be too early to see if such an impact
emerged in England and Wales.
"I think having civil partnerships is going to mean a lot more
security, financially, without the need to seek legal recourse, which in
turn means less stress and that will be beneficial.
"There is also the issue of prejudice and hassle that people can
encounter in their every day lives, with the rights these partnerships have
this will be reduced."
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