/ 9 August 2006

Healthcare workers in need

Aids-related deaths in South Africa: 1 867 909 at noon on August 9 2006

A new study by researchers at Boston University in the United States says African healthcare workers are contracting HIV faster than they are being lured abroad by better-paying jobs.

According to their findings, published in the latest edition of United Kingdom medical journal, The Lancet, twice as many healthcare staffers in Zambia, for example, died of Aids-related illnesses than were leaving to work in Britain.

Frank Feeley, the report’s author, suggested that while policymakers might be tempted to focus on halting emigration as the best strategy to strengthen the health service, it was time to put more effort into keeping HIV-positive professionals alive. — Plusnews

Estimated worldwide HIV infections: 186 1268 at noon on Wednesday August 2

A growing risk: Young people in developing countries are in growing danger of HIV infection because of forces beyond their control, an NGO said on Monday.

Sarah Hendriks, of Plan International in Toronto, said this was because the cultural, economic and social factors relating to the decisions about young people’s sexual and reproductive health had greater impact than the acquisition of knowledge itself.

The NGO argued that although education for children and adolescents had improved immeasurably, there was a constant clash between the safety messages being taught and the realities that prevented young people from being able to adopt them.

Source: www.plusnews.org