Mortality rates in East Africa have continued to soar, despite programmes that have been put in place to address them. According to the Arusha-based Commonwealth Regional Health Secretariat, it is estimated that death ratios range up to 1,000 per 100,000 live births, while infant mortality is about 145 per 1,000 live births. In the report contained in their Revised Strategic Plan (2002-2006), in 14 states surveyed, less than 50% of the people accessed contraceptives.

The Nigerian National Action Committee on AIDS last week launched a five-year "Behaviour Change Communication Strategy" to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS in the country, Nigeria's This Day reports. The initiative provides a "strategic framework for combating HIV and AIDS that is realistic, practical and responsive to local realities," NACA Chair Babatunde Osotimehin said, adding, "It builds on internationally documented and scalable best practices and will serve as a guide for government and all its partners to help Nigerians adopt healthy behaviour and sustainable lifestyle changes to slow the HIV and AIDS epidemic".

As the cost of medical care in Zimbabwe continues to rise, an increasing number of patients have turned to traditional healers for assistance. As early as five o'clock in the morning, patients accompanied by their relatives start arriving at the homestead of Erina Muguyo, a renowned traditional healer in the Porta Farm area about 30 kilometres west of Harare.

The percentage of Nigeria's population infected with the HIV virus fell for the first time last year, according to a government survey of pregnant women tested in ante-natal clinics. However, the sentinel survey conducted by the Ministry of Health showed that the AIDS epidemic was continuing to grow in some regions of the country. It also predicted that the number of Nigerians infected with the virus that causes AIDS would rise sharply over the next five years.

Malnutrition due to the ongoing food crisis, the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and overcrowded urban areas are all contributing to a rise in tuberculosis (TB) infections in Zimbabwe. Nicholas Siziba, the national coordinator of the Ministry of Health's special TB programme, sounded the alarm while visiting Matabeleland South province - one of the worst-affected in terms of TB rates.

Save the Children is seeking a HIV/AIDS Adviser to provide technical support to programme staff involved in the implementation of HIV/AIDS related projects and assist in the development of proposals and the start up of new interventions.

The devastating impact of HIV-AIDS on the education sector is of grave concern, says Basic Education Minister John Mutorwa. Motivating the largest allocation in this year's national Budget - a whopping N$2,4 billion - in the National Assembly, Mutorwa said the pandemic had the "potential to nullify all the good work that is being planned and done within the sector". The allocation, which is almost seven per cent more than last year, will provide for the education of 566 740 school children and 27 000 distance education learners, adult literacy for 40 000 people and the services of 23 000 staff, of whom 18 000 are teachers.

Some 44 church leaders in the Central African Republic (CAR) completed last Thursday a four-day training course on HIV/AIDS awareness, organised by the Ecumenical Initiative on HIV in Africa and a local NGO. A member of the Ecumenical Initiative, Rosalie Koudougueret-Malogba, told IRIN that the church leaders, representing 15 religious institutions, were trained on the different means of HIV/AIDS infection as well as means of protection against the scourge.

Traditional chiefs travelled more than 1,000 kilometres recently through Burkina Faso's northern Sahel in a caravan, organized in cooperation with UNDP, to help stop the spread of HIV/AIDS, which has spread dramatically in the west African country. The three-day car caravan visited the region's two main provinces, Seno and Soum, holding meetings in six towns and villages to alert residents about the epidemic and encourage local HIV/AIDS awareness and prevention activities.

Public health experts met in New York recently to discuss expanding access in developing nations to artemisinin-combination therapy (ACT), which offers one of the fastest and most effective cures for malaria, USA Today reports. Malaria parasites have become resistant to older drugs, but funding for the newer ACT remains a problem. ACT costs about $1.50 for a three-day course, compared with 10 cents for older drugs such as chloroquine and Fansidar. Many African governments can devote just $5 per person annually to public health.

Many Nigerians remain ignorant about Aids. Nigeria has one of the world's highest numbers of people living with the Aids virus, the health minister has said. Eyitayo Lambo said that some 2.3m Nigerians have already died from Aids, while 3.8m were HIV- positive. Only South Africa and India have more people infected with HIV. The rate of Aids infection is much lower in West Africa than in southern Africa, where 30% of the population of some countries is HIV positive. Nigeria - Africa's most populous country, with some 130m people - has been criticised for not doing enough to fight Aids.

The UN ‘World Youth Report 2003’ highlights the impact of HIV/AIDS on many of the world's 1.1 billion young people. Even though they now have greater access to education and information than ever before, HIV/AIDS has taken a ‘heavy toll’ and ‘transformed the lives’ of young people. The report produced by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA), said as many as 7 000 young people were infected with HIV each day.

HIV prevalence in Uganda has dropped 70% since the early 1990s primarily because of a "successful" public HIV/AIDS prevention campaign that encourages avoiding "casual" sexual activity, according to a study published in the April 30 issue of the journal Science, BBC News reports (BBC News, 4/30). Drs. Rand Stoneburner and Daniel Low-Beer of University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom analyzed population-level HIV and behavioural data from Uganda and neighbouring countries -including Kenya, Malawi and Zambia - to assess the validity and determinants of declines in HIV prevalence and examine the potential influences of prevention interventions.

Malaria was responsible for one out of three deaths in children and one out of 10 deaths in pregnant women and cost Nigeria 132 billion Naira per year to treat, minister of health Prof Eyitayo Lambo said at the commemoration of the fourth Africa Malaria day. Prof Lambo said government had adjusted its fiscal policies to include zero concessional duties for insecticides for public health use, a reduction of taxes and tariffs on yarns and the maintenance of a 40% import duty on imported nets to protect local industries.

At least 100,000 health workers are needed to distribute anti-AIDS drugs in Africa, where 70 percent of the world's HIV/AIDS sufferers live, the head of the World Health Organisation said Wednesday. "It's difficult to grasp the magnitude of the problem," Dr. Lee Jong-Wook said while visiting Singapore. "The 8,000 people dying every day from AIDS is equivalent to 30 jumbo jets crashing every day."

South Africa's the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) has welcomed the re-appointment of Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, with whom the organisation has had a fraught relationship over the last four years. “The re-appointment of Health Minister, Dr Manto Tshabalala-Msimang will be a disappointment for many of us, especially the range of actors in the health sector. However, we urge Minister Tshabalala-Msimang to re-establish a working relationship in the interest of fulfilling the mandate of our people,” said the TAC.

Matam, in the far north of Senegal was chosen to host this year’s fourth annual Africa Malaria day celebrations, with organisers highlighting the vulnerability of children to this potentially fatal mosquito-born disease. "Can we dream, one day, of a malaria-free world?" chanted a group of children to the assembled dignitaries, press and local community. This year, the Roll Back Malaria Partnership, whose members include UNICEF, the WHO, the UNDP and the World Bank, worked with the government of Senegal to highlight the risks faced by children.

A number of initiatives aimed at extending medical services to the rural poor have been launched by enterprising doctors in Zimbabwe. Many Zimbabweans are finding it harder to pay for medical treatment as inflation of around 600 percent translates into soaring fees for private doctors and shortages of medicines in public hospitals. Private hospitals, doctors and dentists increased their fees by between 50 percent and 100 percent at the beginning of April, hard on the heels of a similar price hike three months ago.

An association for HIV positive people in Burundi, the Reseau Burundais des personnes vivant avec le VIH, wants the government to enact a law protecting affected people against discrimination and stigmatisation. "We demand that the government should promulgate the law protecting HIV positive people as soon as possible, not only to protect HIV infected people but to protect the entire community," Felix Ntungumburanye, the head of the association, said during a workshop in the capital, Bujumbura.

In addition to working through partnerships with others, and advocating for open society ideals, the HIV/AIDS Programme Officer (PO) will develop strategies, guidelines and policies for OSISA’s HIV /AIDS programme to enable OSISA to make a meaningful contribution to HIV /AIDS response in Southern Africa. The vision of the programme is a “Southern African region that is totally engaged in overcoming the HIV/AIDS pandemic through the deployment of appropriate policies, resources and leadership”.