Mail & Guardian
Mail & Guardian
Ida Jooste

Creator

Ida Jooste

Guest Author

Want the six-monthly HIV prevention jab, lenacapavir but don’t know what happens at the clinic? Here’s your step-by-step guide. Photo: Anna-Maria van Niekerk
PUBLIC HEALTH

Want the six-monthly HIV jab? Here’s your nine-step clinic cheat sheet

A step-by-step guide to what really happens at the clinic when you go for lenacapavir, the new six-monthly HIV prevention jab, from initial testing to injection day.

  • Ida Jooste
8 min read
Clinics in South Africa and Zambia don’t yet have enough doses of the groundbreaking anti-HIV jab lenacapavir for everyone who wants it. How do you persuade people to want a new medicine when there isn’t enough of it to go around? Photo: Tara Winstead/Pexels
PUBLIC HEALTH

Meet four people who got the HIV prevention jab

As South Africa rolls out the six-monthly HIV prevention injection, Lenacapavir, four people from high-risk groups explain why they chose the shot over daily pills and what their…

  • Mia Malan
  • Ida Jooste
10 min read
HIV PREVENTION
Video

SA and Zambia’s HIV shot dilemma: Demand versus supply

South Africa and Zambia are grappling with a significant challenge in rolling out lenacapavir, a new six-monthly HIV prevention injection. Despite high demand and promising early…

  • Ida Jooste
11 min read
HIV funding cuts fall hardest on key populations: sex workers, gay and bisexual men, transgender women and people who inject drugs — who have a much higher chance of getting HIV and depend heavily on specialised, donor-funded services which the government has been slow to take over. (Dylan Bush, Bhekisisa)
BHEKISISA

More HIV funding cuts are coming for SA. This time it’s a slow fade, but with clear risks

The Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria will start to cut its grant support to South Africa in just two years, with its final grant ending in eight years. Some…

  • Ida Jooste
12 min read
Superbugs are a big public health issue. So is climate change. Put the two together and the problem becomes even bigger. (Dylan Bush)
ACINETOBACTER BAUMANNII
Video

Superbugs plus climate change equals double trouble. Here’s why

As the Earth becomes hotter, we’re seeing more floods and droughts. Flooding can make superbugs spread faster and further. And heat helps germs adapt faster

  • Ida Jooste
11 min read
We talked to experts about their take on a few of the most pressing public health issues this year. (Jay Caboz)
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN HEALTHCARE

Here’s what’s on South Africa’s 2026 public health agenda

We talked to experts in obesity, tobacco, artificial intelligence, HIV, TB and the NHI to find out what we can expect — and what we can’t — this year

  • Ida Jooste
  • Tanya Pampalone
18 min read
Long shot?: In April next year, South Africa plans to start rolling out an anti-HIV jab, taken only twice a year, that could end Aids in the country within 14 to 18 years. But is our public health system equipped to keep track of millions, who are on the shot? (Unsplash)
AIDS

The six-monthly anti-HIV jab is coming. But can SA keep track of millions of users?

The shot, called Lenacapavir, has a 100% success rate in preventing young women from getting HIV through sex

  • Ida Jooste
  • Mia Malan
10 min read
Misinformation fuelled by US health secretary Robert Kennedy Jr is creating a dangerous lack of trust in vaccines and South Africa’s public health experts are scared. Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr
CHILDHOOD IMMUNISATION

US making diphtheria great again? Why SA’s public health experts are worried about America’s RFK Jr

Misinformation fuelled by the US health secretary is creating a dangerous – and growing – lack of trust in vaccines

  • Ida Jooste
  • Tanya Pampalone
11 min read
The Health and Human Rights Oral History Project’s video testimonies that capture three decades of health activism from around the world, might provide a blueprint for the next wave of HIV activism. (Bhekisisa)
AIDS DENIALISM
Video

Fighting for funds: A new era of HIV activism

Instead of the Aids denialism of decades past, it’s US funding cuts that could lead to up to 300 000 more HIV infections in the next four years. Activists like Sisonke Msimang…

  • Ida Jooste
9 min read
The Global Fund for HIV, TB and Malaria says it will fund the roll-out of the twice-yearly anti-HIV jab, lenacapavir, for poorer countries, including South Africa, with or without the help of the US government’s Aids fund, Pepfar
AIDS

The Global Fund will roll out the twice-yearly anti-HIV jab — with or without Pepfar

In December, the Global Fund and the US President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief committed to funding the roll-out of lenacapavir in countries they support

  • Ida Jooste
9 min read
IDA JOOSTE

News for Kids

In a groundbreaking move, the SABC now offers a TV news bulletin specifically designed for children. Ida Jooste looks into the production values behind the concept and gets some…

  • Ida Jooste
4 min read