To Western medical workers, traditional African healers have become indispensable in the fight against AIDS in Cameroon and around Africa. The respect these healers garner from their communities makes them a key mouthpiece for passing along accurate information about how the disease is spread. Their holistic approach toward healing has produced results that impress even visiting health workers.

The African Union Summit in Maputo will link to the rest of the world during the Special Session on HIV/AIDS, Malaria & TB on 10 July (1:30 - 4:45 Maputo time, 12:30 pm - 3:50 pm, London time) There will be a live webcast, online survey and online discussion forum of this important event.

HIV is rampant among young people in South Africa, despite sound knowledge about sexual health risks. Levels of perceived vulnerability among this group are low and unprotected sex is common. Researchers from the London School of Economics studied a participatory programme seeking to empower young people to change gender norms as an HIV prevention strategy.

HIV infection is a major cause of death in sub-Saharan Africa. Within that region, existing studies have found higher levels of HIV infection in urban over rural areas, but no clear relationship between socio-economic status and risk of HIV infection. This study examined the link between socio-economic status (SES) and risk of HIV infection in an urban city with high prevalence of HIV. It found that new infections may be taking place fastest among women of low SES.

Is changing sexual behaviour an effective tool for reducing the levels of HIV infection? If so, how can behavioural change programmes best be implemented at community level? Research by the Medical Research Council (UK) Programme in Uganda explores the implementation of a randomised controlled trial (RCT) set up to study the effects that community Information, Education and Communication (IEC) and improved management of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) can have on STD and HIV infection rates on a rural population in south west Uganda.

Dr. Kenneth Kaunda, who became the first president when Zambia attained independence in October 1954, told participants at a United Nations Development Programme meeting in Johannesburg that HIV/Aids was not a death sentence. “If I had been found positive, I still would have used that status to campaign against the pandemic, as I do now,” said the 79 year-old former president.

U.S. President George W. Bush's surprise pick of a former top executive of a major U.S. pharmaceutical company and major Republican contributor as his global AIDS co-ordinator has drawn expressions of concern and even outrage among Africa and AIDS activists.

A group of HIV-positive people have launched a project through which they can be "hired" to present talks at schools, churches and other organisations in Namibia.

A total of 127 people died of HIV-AIDS-related diseases between April and December 2002, while 39 succumbed to the virus during the first three months of this year at Outapi in the Omusati Region in Namibia.

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Tokyo Sexwale, the former Gauteng premier, has donated 351 television sets worth around R1 million to the Department of Health during a ceremony at the Alexandra Community Health Centre in Johannesburg.

To consolidate Zambia's recovery from last year's widespread crop failures, the UN Resident Coordinator has highlighted the need for new initiatives to help the country achieve sustainable food security.

In Burkina Faso, Gueswende Public Primary School addresses local poverty and national environmental issues through agricultural education. Through a gardening programme at school, pupils are growing vegetables and maintaining a fruit orchard. A portion of the produce goes to improving the diet of the school lunches while the other portion is sold.

Humanitarian groups this week reported a critical breakdown in the essential medicines pipeline in three provinces of Angola. Most affected by the shortages were the central Bie and Huambo provinces and Benguela in the west.

Health Minister Charity Ngilu has intervened in a major row with Non Governmental Organisations (NGOs) over the disbursement of HIV/Aids Global Fund money amounting to Sh2 billion. Some 100 NGOs have cried foul after their names were left out from the list of organisations that are to benefit from these funds.

As more than 14 million people in Southern Africa face the threat of starvation, aid operations in the region continue to be hampered by the controversy about the uses and dangers of genetically modified foods. Although the region has produced enough food to meet two-thirds of its needs, the World Food Programme (WFP) says Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe will need to import at least 2.65 million tonnes over the next 12 months.

While the government holds up its mother-to-child HIV-transmission programme as the continent’s largest, it is turning into a shambles in many provinces. Investigation has revealed that mismanagement within the HIV/Aids sections of the national and provincial health departments could result in the dismal failure of the programme.

African countries must invest heavily in health in order to overcome obstacles to the achievement of their development goals, the UN World Health Organisation (WHO) director-general for the continent, Ibrahim Samba, said last Thursday. "This would constitute an excellent strategy in the fight against poverty," Samba said at a WHO subcommittee meeting of 12 African countries in Brazzaville, capital of Republic of Congo.

Household food stocks have shown marginal improvements in Zimbabwe, but the majority of households still have less than one months supply, with half estimated to have no food in stock. Thirteen districts still reported households consuming unusual foods or `famine' foods, says the NGO Food Security Network in a May report, drawn from 145 monitoring reports from 58 districts from all provinces of Zimbabwe. Food insecurity in May was attributed to poor harvests, inability to afford food, seizure of maize grain by police at roadblocks, political bias and difficulties for particular groups in accessing food.

Governments, international organisations, foundations and nongovernmental organisations in 2003 will spend an estimated $4.7 billion to address the AIDS epidemic in low- and middle-income countries, but that amount is less than half of the more than $10.5 billion that will be needed each year by 2005 to fight the epidemic in those countries, according to a new UNAIDS report.