Aids-related deaths in South Africa: 2 113 571 at noon on Wednesday April 25
Slander: Libyan Judge Salem Hamrouni last Sunday postponed a hearing in the slander trial brought against six medical workers sentenced to death for allegedly intentionally infecting hundreds of Libyan children with HIV.
The judge postponed the hearing to allow the medical workers’ lawyers time to prepare their defence in the case.
The five Bulgarian nurses and one Palestinian doctor were sentenced to death in 2006 in a retrial, after the Libyan Supreme Court overturned their conviction in 2005. They are accused of allegedly infecting 426 children through contaminated blood products at Al Fateh Children’s Hospital in Benghazi, Libya.
The health workers say they are innocent of the charges, claiming Libyan officials tortured them to obtain confessions.
A Libyan court in June 2005 acquitted nine police officers charged with torturing the medical workers and forcing them to confess.
In the current slander case, Libyan police officer Juma Mishri and a doctor, Abdulmajid Alshoul, are asking for $3,9-million each in compensation for the nurses’ torture accusations. A further three police officers have joined the slander case in compensation for distress caused by the torture allegations.
Source: www.kaisernetwork.org
Estimated HIV deaths in South Africa: 2 106 935 as at April 18
HIV-negative please: Young Ugandans living with HIV prefer to date partners who are not HIV-positive. This was revealed in a study among adolescents living with HIV at the Paediatric Infectious Diseases Clinic (PIDC) in Mulago, Kampala.
Presenting the adolescent sexuality study, Dr Sabrina Bakeera-Kitaka, the head of adolescent programmes at PIDC, said these young people have matured to a stage where thoughts of having children and founding families come naturally. And for this, they prefer partners who are HIV-negative for fear of re-infection. The desire to have children is a barrier to protection.
Bakeera said: ‘Others have difficulties with disclosure when they get a new sexual partner and this, coupled with the partner pressure to have unprotected sex, risks further spread of the disease.”
Source: New Vision