Almost a year into a cholera outbreak, aid agencies and Angola's government have learnt to address the symptoms, but tackling it's causes remains a challenge.

This article explores the determinants of public satisfaction (or dissatisfaction) with health and education services in Africa.

Nobel peace laureates Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Professor Wangari Maathai have appealed to Africa’s Heads of State meeting in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, to renew their commitment to improving public health by among other things, allocating 15 per cent of their national budgets to health in line with the commitment made at the special Heads of State summit in Abuja in 2002.

Africa must work towards providing home-based rapid diagnostic test kits and give more consideration to gender issues in the fight against malaria, a new report recommends. The report, commissioned by Femmes Africa Solidarite and released at the African Union summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia last week (25 January), explores the issue of gender in malaria policies.

Save the Children UK has started working in Niger in July 2005, due to the ongoing food crisis which is affecting millions of people. Community-based therapeutic nutritional care (CTC) and primary health care (PHC) to children under-five year’s old in Maradi and Zinder Regions are so far the main intervention domains. SC UK is now about to launch a new food security and livelihood programme in the same areas. This new programme will be a pilot one for the Sahel region and will be therefore highly supported by the Regional and London Offices.

Startling new evidence from a three-year survey shows that HIV is now growing fastest among those who are wealthier and educated. “Our belief that HIV is a disease of the impoverished, the unemployed, the uneducated is actually wrong,” says Professor Carel van Aardt, Director of Research at UNISA’s Bureau of Market Research. “It seems that the most rapid growth at the moment is among the educated, among the employed, among the people with higher incomes, and also the people in high class in society.

More than 90 people were killed and at least 300 injured when security forces in Guinea opened fire to put down protests during a two-week general strike this month, a human rights group said on Wednesday (31 January).

Nigeria confirmed the first human death from the H5N1 virus in sub-Saharan Africa on Wednesday (January 31) after tests on a dead woman showed she had contracted bird flu. The 22-year-old died after feathering and disembowelling an infected chicken. She was from Lagos, the commercial capital of Africa's most populous country, Information Minister Frank Nweke said. Test on three other victims, one of them the woman's mother, were inconclusive.

The knowledge, priorities and aspirations of small scale producers are rarely included in policy debates on the future of food, farming and development. In response, a recent electronic conference, "The Future of Food and Small-scale Producers" sought the views of indigenous, small, and family farmers from over 30 developed and developing countries. The forum also included the opinions of landless people and fishing communities, as well as their representative organisations.

In his latest State of the Union message, U.S. President George Bush declared "To whom much is given, much is required." He went on to pledge to "continue to fight HIV/AIDS, especially on the continent of Africa." But while activists acknowledge the additional attention given to health in recent years, they say both African and international leaders are still falling far short of fulfilling their promises.

Scaling up effective partnerships: A guide to working with faith-based organisations in the response to HIV and AIDS provides background information and case studies, dispels myths, and gives practical guidance for United Nations staff, government officials, positive people's networks, non-governmental organizations, foundations, and the private sector who want to collaborate with faith-based organizations on joint projects related to HIV and AIDS.

Pharmaceutical company Novartis is taking the Indian government to court. If the company wins, millions of people across the globe could have their sources of affordable medicines dry up. Novartis was one of the 39 companies that took the South African government to court five years ago, in an effort to overturn the country's medicines act that was designed to bring drug prices down. Now Novartis is up to it again and is targeting India.

As Zimbabwe's disgruntled doctors and nurses continue their strike over low salaries and poor working conditions, concern is growing about how the prolonged stay-away is affecting HIV-positive patients. The strike by health professionals, now more than a month old, has left dozens of desperate patients without medical care in rural and urban areas.

Health campaigners and activists led by 2004 Nobel Laureate Prof Wangari Mathai have petitioned the African Union member states for failing to honour their 15 per cent pledge of their annual budgets on health care.

This fact became public knowledge as the WSF entered the third day.

The petition comes ahead of the forthcoming AU Heads of State and Government summit in Addis Ababa.

The petition by South African Nobel Laureate Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu, but signed on his behalf by Prof Mathai calls for Africa leaders to act fast and implement their pledges in a bid to reverse the ugly trends of treatable diseases in Africa.

“We write to appeal to you to act without further delay on arguably the most crucial challenge African leaders will have to confront in modern times, that of taking immediate and concrete actions to end the tragic loss of an estimated 8 million African lives annually to preventable, treatable or manageable diseases, illnesses and health conditions,” the Petition read in part.

Prof Mathai noted that sustainable financing for public health in Africa is arguably the most important challenge facing our continent today but which is put at the bottom of their agenda. She has thus challenged African leaders to revisit their 15% commitment as a matter of urgency lest Africans risks dying before their time.

In a campaign rally dubbed ’ 15% now’ activists noted that Africa risks loosing all her people to preventable and manageable diseases that have failed to top its leaders’ budgetary agendas. Yet in 2001 AU member states signed the Abuja declaration that called for each country to commit at least 15% or more of national budgets to health care.

“Africa is at the brink of extinction because our leaders have failed to prioritize the lives of their people. An estimated 40 million people Africans have died from health related conditions as a result of the Abuja commitment not being met.”

Citing the example of her own government’s negligence, she noted that the Kenyan government has failed to stop companies from producing thin plastic bags that litter the streets of Nairobi, acting as breeding grounds for mosquitoes and causing malaria.

Rotimi Sankore of CREDO Africa, an organization that campaigns for African rights lashed on African leaders for failing to break the ceilings as regards health issues. He accused them of prioritizing their own political interests in the expense of the lives of their people.

“Denying people of their health rights is like a death sentence. This is like genocide as generations will continue to be wiped off. Without mincing words, Sankore presented the grim statistics from UNAIDS and WHO indicating that 40 million Africans have died from health related conditions and many more will continue dying if our leaders fail to act accordingly.

The 2006 statistics from global and African health institutions indicate that at least 586,911 Africans are dying from TB annually, this is 35% of the world total. Figures also show that 24 million people living with HIV Aids have TB and that over 4 million children under the age of five die annually due to TB related infections.

Sankore sees the whole picture as damning as these statistics are merely seen as figures. The annual Aids death figures for Africa alone is 2.1 million. An estimated 24.7 million Africans are living with HIV and new infections are as high as 2.8 million. In the case of malaria, annual African deaths are estimated at 1,136,000. Also over 12 million African children have been orphaned by HIV Aids.

Chair of the Nigerian Social Forum, Abiola Akiyode-Afolabi said that Africa presents the worst indicator of women health issues with the continent having the highest number of women living with HIV Aids.

Gender budgeting, she said was crucial if women are to overcome some reproductive health issues that continue to surface amongst them. She urged nations to build alliances and mobilize health institutions. “Our leaders have signed these agreements so it is time we force them to ratify the protocols of the rights of women.

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The government of Tanzania's semi-autonomous island of Zanzibar will not lift a ban imposed in 2005 on poultry imports, despite pressure from poultry farmers and retailers, the island's Chief Minister, Shamsi Vuai Nahodha, said on Thursday. The ban will remain in force indefinitely," Nahodha said in a statement issued in the capital, Stone Town.

Zambia's attempts to promote paediatric antiretroviral (ARV) drug adherence are being undermined by families and communities who shield children in their care from knowing their HIV/AIDS status, health experts say. A report by IRIN revealed that it is easier to counsel adults living with the virus, but families caring for HIV-positive children often hide the truth from the child.

A rise of more than 100 percent in the price of antiretroviral drugs is likely to put the life-prolonging medication beyond the reach of hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans living with HIV. Pharmacists in Bulawayo increased the price of a monthly course of ARVs from an average of Z$30,000 (US$120 at the official exchange rate) to between Z$80,000 (US$320) and Z$100,000 (US$400).

The HIV/AIDS and the Media Project investigates the role and the impact of the news media on the HIV/AIDS pandemic in South Africa. We offer two annual 4-6 month fellowships to working journalists to undertake longer term and in-depth research and writing outside of the newsroom. The writing that results from these fellowships is published in a wide range of media and peer-reviewed journals, posts Journalism.co.za.

A prospective cohort study has found that HIV-positive Kenyan mothers who breastfed their babies had faster declines in CD4 cell count and body mass index than those who formula-fed. However, breastfeeding had no effect on viral load or overall mortality among the mothers after two years.

The classroom has become a front line in the fight against AIDS in southern Sudan, where many teenagers are attending school for the first time now that the 21-year civil war has ended.