Aids-related deaths in South Africa: 2 259 638 at noon on September 26
Broken promises: The British government stands accused of breaking its G8 pledge to help defeat Aids after it revealed it would only marginally increase its contribution to the Global Fund for Aids, Malaria and Tuberculosis.
The International Development Secretary, Douglas Alexander, promised £1-billion over the next eight years to the fund, but campaigners said this fell far short of the G8 pledge to treble contributions by 2010.
‘This is only £125-million a year. Currently the United Kingdom gives £100-million a year,” said Steve Cockburn, of the Stop Aids campaign. ‘It is astonishing how quickly promises become meaningless. In June the G8 promised to treble the size of the Global Fund by 2010, in order to tackle three diseases that kill six million people each year.”
Campaigners, who include Oxfam and Action Aid as well as United States groups, are concerned that the low offer from the UK will have an impact on the generosity of other European nations. The US undertakes to provide a third of the money for the Global Fund — an amount that rises or falls according to other countries’ contributions. Campaigners had called on Britain to give £700-million over the next three years.
UNAids raised the bar again in a report that concludes that available resources for HIV/Aids must more than quadruple from their 2007 level if the world is to achieve the goal set by the G8 of universal access to treatment for all. About $42,2-billion will be needed by 2010, it says, rising to $54-billion by 2015.
Source: The Guardian
Aids-related deaths in South Africa: 2 253 001 at noon, September 19
Unpopular contraceptive: The female condom has failed to take off in Kenya, depriving women of one of the few means over which they have control of protecting themselves against HIV infection in male-dominated societies.
‘The introduction of the female condom in Kenya has failed to slow down HIV in women,” said Dr Enoch Kibunguchy, Assistant Minister for Health. About 740 000 women are infected with the virus, and carry the burden of HIV in the country.
‘The female condom was introduced in Kenya in a wrong manner. Manufacturers dumped the condoms in the country and did not bother to provide accurate information on its use,” he said. ‘A belated attempt by the government to raise its profile came too late, as attitude against it had already become ingrained.”
More than 200 000 of the condoms were supplied in 2007 but consumption was a paltry 10 000, while about 12-million male condoms were used every month, according to the director of the National Aids Control Council, Professor Alloys Orago.
‘While consumption of the male condom has been rising because of its low cost, the cost of the female condom is outrageously high,” he added. The female condom retails for as much as $3, which is beyond the means of most women.
Cultural barriers also often made it difficult for women to negotiate safer sex. ‘Although the [female] condoms are dispensed at government facilities for free, few women go for them,” said Kibunguchy. ‘Women give the condom a wide berth because it is cumbersome to wear, while others find it embarrassing. Even among the highly educated and professional class of women, the female condom is not a popular contraceptive.”
Reversing the unpopularity of the female condom would require ‘a change in attitude”, Kibunguchy commented. ‘Even economic empowerment, although critical, may not raise female condom uptake if supply and information are not well matched.”
Aids activists agreed, with many blaming the poor uptake of the female condom on insufficient effort by government to popularise it.
Allan Ragi, executive director of the Kenya Aids NGOs Consortium, called on the government to refocus its energies on making the female condom more widely available.
‘For poor, rural women, the female condom is a lifeline; if a woman’s husband shows up drunk, wanting to have sex, if she’s already … [got] the condom then she … [can be] protected,” he said. ‘But accessibility has been a problem — where is this woman supposed to get the condom?”
Better marketing and more information were necessary to ensure that all women in Kenya had the condom as an option for protection against sexually transmitted infections and pregnancy, Ragi said.
Source: Plus News
Aids-related deaths in South Africa: 2 246 361 at noon on September 12
Volunteers help fight against Aids: Although scientists hope that a vaccine will eventually offer the best protection against HIV infection, the complex biology of the virus has posed constant challenges and even a partially effective vaccine is still some years away.
A number of potential HIV vaccines have made it out of the laboratory, but clinical trials on humans are still only in the second of three phases. The primary goals in the current round of trials are to establish safety, dosage and their ability to trigger an immune response.
According to Samuel Rampho, a study coordinator at Aurum’s research site in Klerksdorp, volunteers tend to view participation in vaccine trials as their contribution to the Aids fight. ‘Most would say they’re very tired of this pandemic. Even if they don’t benefit directly, people behind them might, so they feel it’s something good they’re doing for their communities.”
Rampho also estimated that about 80% of trial participants had seen people close to them battle with the virus.
Chuma Ludidi (22) was motivated by the experience of watching her older sister suffer from Aids-related illnesses while trying to keep her status a secret from their devoutly Christian mother. Ludidi heard about the vaccine trial when she came to Aurum’s voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) clinic last year to find out what her own HIV status was.
”Before, we never got an opportunity like this, we thought people who took part in trials were people who’ve got qualifications.
‘I wanted to join, but during the physical screening they found out I had anaemia,” she said. After being treated for the condition, Ludidi volunteered for a new vaccine trial, which is recruiting 3 000 participants between the ages of 18 and 35 at five different sites in South Africa.
Volunteering for the trial, known as ‘Phambili” (going forward), meant making a four-year commitment to visit the clinic at regular intervals and, in the case of female volunteers, avoiding pregnancy.
The Phambili trial is being advertised at public health clinics, local NGOs and youth centres, with slogans such as ‘Aids will be stopped by South Africans like you!”
Prospective participants are invited to attend an information session, in which they learn how an HIV vaccine works, the potential risks and benefits of taking part, and what would be required of them. Before signing an informed consent form, potential recruits must be HIV negative, undergo a thorough health screening and receive extensive counselling.
Rampho said one of the main challenges in recruitment has been explaining that HIV vaccines do not work like traditional vaccines, in which a weak version of the virus is administered in order to trigger the body’s immune response when it is exposed to the real disease.
Instead, the vaccine delivers harmless copies of three HIV genes made in the laboratory. ‘We had one case where the mother of a participant was convinced her son was being injected with the HI virus,” Rampho recalled. ‘We have to explain it doesn’t work like a flu vaccine.”
Volunteers are given symptom logbooks to record any side effects they might experience after having a vaccine shot. Professor Gavin Churchyard, principal investigator at the Aurum Institute in Klerksdorp, pointed out that only one participant in the phase II trial had experienced an ‘adverse event” that may have been related to the vaccine.
Source: Plusnews