Kenyan scientists have been asked to help resolve the controversy surrounding genetically modified (GM) foods. Egerton University Vice-Chancellor, Prof Ezra Maritim, told the experts to advise the Government on the benefits and dangers of using GM foods. Maritim said Africa had been caught up in a debate that was going on elsewhere, with very little input from local scientists.

A year after an international advocacy campaign aimed at winning HIV/AIDS treatment for workers of multinational corporations in Africa, AIDS activists contend that Coca-Cola continues to stall rolling out treatment programs with its bottlers in Africa.

Mbulawa Shiri grimaced on the 30th October 2003 as he lay on a hospital bed at Parirenyatwa Hospital, Zimbabwe's largest referral health facility. Zimbabwe's doctors had gone on strike, demanding higher salaries. The doctors argued that such a hike was needed to keep pace with inflation in a country where the black market sets the real cost of living.

Leaders in Senegal - from government and business to the arts and media - are embarking on initiatives against HIV/AIDS to reinforce the country's success in limiting the spread of the deadly disease. These activities began to take shape at a workshop earlier this year in which eight ministers learned the need for emotional intelligence - traits such as empathy, motivation, persistence, warmth and social skills - vital for effective interpersonal relations and leadership in dealing with the epidemic.

Medact, together with the People's Health Movement and GEGA, is planning the publication of the Global Health Watch, a report providing a civil society view on the state of the world's health. In preparation for this report, Medact is calling for testimonies from civil society on the different issues covered by the report. We will launch this call in several waves: firstly, we are looking for testimonies on the effects of the marketization of: Health care provision in the developing world; and Water, sanitation and electricity services.

On April 7, 2003, the New York Times carried a story on a massacre in the Democratic Republic of Congo in which up to 966 non-combatant civilians were slaughtered by warring factions in the east of the country. The story, authored by the Associated Press, ran on page A6 and took up less than a full column of newsprint. Amid the flurry of Iraq war coverage many English-language newspapers made no mention of the Congo massacres. It seems unlikely that the New York Times would give similarly cursory treatment to a massacre of 966 civilians in France, Britain, South Korea or Israel. This disparity leaves us with a question: Is Iraq more important than the Congo?

Maternal mortality rates in Ghana, as in other African countries, are very high. One study estimated the rate at 2 145 per 100,000 live births while another study estimated 7 406 per 100, 000 live births.

The World Health Organisation was this week due to reveal the first details of its global strategy to bring low-cost HIV/AIDS drugs to 3 million people in poor countries, a plan that top officials said will eventually include endorsement of pills that combine three antiretroviral drugs in a single tablet, the Washington Post reported Saturday.

A recent row in South Africa over the deployment of HIV-positive soldiers on peacekeeping missions has turned the spotlight on the issue of HIV testing and the exclusion of HIV-positive individuals from the army. South Africa's Minister of Defence Mosiuoa Lekota sparked controversy earlier this month when news reports quoted him as saying: "Anybody with the condition (HIV/AIDS) cannot be recruited (into the defence force)."

Former United States President Bill Clinton has announced a deal with four generic-drug companies to slash the price of AIDS drugs in parts of the developing world.

The Equinet Newsletter is the newsletter of the Network for Equity in Health in Southern Africa. The Newsletter is delivered by e-mail twice a month and includes the following sections: Editorial, Equity and health general, Resource allocation, Public-private subsidies, Household poverty, WTO, economic and social policy, Human resources, Human rights and health, Research and Policy, Popular participation / governance and health, SADC News, Useful Resources, Letters and Comments, and Jobs and Announcements. Subscription is free.

We are calling on journalists who report on HIV and AIDS to submit their entries to the inaugural, annual HIV/AIDS Red Ribbon Media Award for Excellence in Journalism. The Award aims to encourage the development of a core of high-level journalists and other media professionals to produce information and communication materials in the printed and electronic media for general consumption and advocacy.

Fifteen million Ethiopians are facing a deadly malaria epidemic, according to a warning issued by the UN last Wednesday. This new development comes in the wake of an unprecedented and complex humanitarian crisis hitting the impoverished country, leaving 13 million people in need of food aid.

The decline of Zimbabwe's health system, once one of the best in the region, has been underlined by the unravelling of its national immunisation programme. Until 2001, immunisation coverage for most antigens was over 70 percent. But coverage in some districts has now dropped to 44 percent, and the number of children dying before their first birthday has increased from around 56 per 1,000 live births in 1999 to around 65 per live 1,000 births in 2000.
Related Link:
* Zimbabwe deploys army staff in hospitals
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3223617.stm

The rise in the number of children orphaned by HIV/AIDS in Zambia has forced the World Food Programme (WFP) to scale up its assistance programmes in some of the country's urban centres. WFP information officer Lena Savelli told IRIN on Monday that although food security in Zambia continued to improve, there was growing concern over the plight of vulnerable children, most of whom were left to support households after the death of a parent.

The Ugandan health ministry made its first ever clear commitment on Sunday to buying cheap generic copies of anti-retroviral (ARV) drugs. "We have a law in place that allows us to import generic drugs in a crisis, and we will certainly be doing this," Health Minister Jim Muhwezi, told IRIN at the 11th conference of the Global Network for People Living with HIV/AIDS, held in the capital, Kampala.

A national immunisation exercise against the polio virus launched in Nigeria last week has been slowed down by the refusal of many people in the country's mainly Muslim north to participate, officials said on Monday. The nationwide campaign was part of a regional effort launched in vulnerable West African countries on Wednesday by international agencies to protect 15 million children against a recent resurgence of polio.

Ugandan Magdalena Achero (not her real name) is a bitter woman. As a school teacher, in a country which has been hailed as a beacon of hope for people living with HIV/AIDS, she has experienced discrimination firsthand. Last month she received a discouraging message from the local education officer. “The District Education Officer said, since everyone in the district knew my HIV status, he could not post me to any school. He said I should look for a school that would accept me, and convince the community to tolerate me, then go back to his office for posting or transfer to that school,” she says.

The prospect of receiving anti-retroviral therapy was brought a little closer to millions of HIV-positive Kenyans recently, with the announcement of a price reduction for some of the drugs that are used to treat AIDS. British-based pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) said last week that it would cut the price of various anti-retrovirals (ARV’s) from between 25 to 43 percent. This comes amidst an ongoing campaign by AIDS activists to lower the cost of ARV’s, which prolong the lives of people infected with the human immunodeficiency virus.

Nominations for the 2004 Gates Award for Global Health are now being accepted. Any organisation from any country in the world that has had a systematic and lasting impact on global health may be nominated for the Gates Award. Nominations must be received by December 5, 2003. For more information or to submit a nomination, visit the Global Health Council’s website: http://www.globalhealth.org.