A review of records from antenatal clinics in Lusaka, Zambia has found that pregnant women were screened for syphilis more commonly after prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission (PMTCT) research and service programmes were implemented at the clinics. This increase in screening was interpreted as a marker of improved routine clinical services for pregnant women.

Children in sub-Saharan Africa born to mothers with CD4 cell counts under 350 cells/mm3 are more likely to die, whether or not the children themselves are HIV-positive, according to a study published in the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes in December 2007. Child malnutrition and low maternal haemoglobin were associated with higher child mortality rates.

After a fortnight of political violence during which an estimated 250,000 Kenyans were displaced, health workers are scrambling to ensure that HIV-positive people on life-prolonging anti-retroviral (ARV) therapy continue to receive their drugs and adequate food supplies.

A Ugandan study has shown that community volunteers can effectively distribute antiretrovirals in rural areas with around 90% of patients adhering to treatment. This week’s Centers for Disease Control newsletter on HIV, Hepatitis, STD and TB Prevention also reports on the link between Christopher Columbus and the spread of syphilis.

More than 550 people have fallen victim to a cholera epidemic so far this year in Lubumbashi, capital of Congo's mineral-rich Katanga province, medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said on Friday. At least eight people have died from the waterborne illness in the city of around 1 million, and 104 are receiving medical care at a treatment centre set up by MSF's Belgian chapter.

The Canadian Coalition is pleased to announce the call for applications for the 5th Summer Institute for New Global Health Researchers, to be held in partnership with Network Environments for Aboriginal Research BC of the University of Victoria, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. The Summer Institute will be held at the Quw'utsun' Cultural and Conference Centre located in the Cowichan Valley, in the southeast corner of Vancouver Island from July 16-23, 2008

At the Integrated Health Centre of Bissita, located in the Bacongo area of Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of Congo, pregnant women seated on a long bench wait to have prenatal examinations. A member of this talkative group, Sylvie Bakani*, wears a concerned expression. Due to deliver in a few weeks, she is also HIV positive.

The monthly "Improvement Meeting" at Qumbu Health Centre, 50km from the Eastern Cape province town of Mthatha, is supposed to start at 9am, but rarely starts before 10am. Many of the nurses attending work at remote rural clinics scattered across Mhlontlo District and have to travel along rudimentary roads using the mini-bus taxis system to reach the meeting, so no-one complains about late arrivals.

Many African countries now have more doctors and nurses working in richer countries abroad than they have at home, research shows. There has long been concern about the exodus of African medics, but the Human Resources for Health study suggests the problem may be greater than assumed. Several countries, including Mozambique and Angola, have more doctors in one single foreign country than at home.

Men who have sex with men (MSM) in Kenya urgently need targeted, HIV risk-reduction prevention information, according to the first study describing HIV prevalence and risk factors in a large group of East African MSM. The study is published in the November 2007 edition of AIDS.

The Kenya Red Cross Society and local partners have started distributing food assistance from the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and the Government of Kenya to tens of thousands of people in the Nairobi slums hardest-hit after days of post-election violence. It was the first time WFP food was handed out in the slums in a general food distribution. The Government of Kenya provided cereals to the Kenya Red Cross (KRC) while WFP gave the pulses, high energy biscuits, vegetable oil and corn-soya blend needed for a full food basket.

Saico Djau is a very frustrated laboratory technician and HIV counsellor. After testing people for HIV and informing them of their status there is nothing else he can do for them if they are HIV-positive, because there is no antiretroviral (ARV) treatment available on Guinea Bissau's Bijagos Islands. He has to give them the bad news and then send them back to their villages.

The high level of gender-based violence in Zambia is preventing many women from accessing HIV/AIDS services, according to a new report by global watchdog Human Rights Watch. The researchers warned that the ability of Zambian women to get HIV/AIDS counselling, testing and information has been "seriously impaired by the perceived and real control of men [particularly intimate partners] over their lives".

Slim Boukhdir, a jailed Tunisian journalist has again gone on a hunger strike in protest against deplorable prison conditions. Boukhdir, who is serving a year's prison sentence at Sfax, 231 km South of the capital Tunis, started the strike on 13 December. Slim's wife who visited him told the Paris-based Reporters sans frontières (RSF) that her husband is kept in an unlit cell with common prisoners purposely to allow prison authorities to monitor him as well as prevent him from resuming his reading.

In the 2007 list of the World's Richest People, 946 named billionaires had a combined wealth of approximately $3.5 trillion. The collective net worth of the richest Americans in 2007 is $1.54 trillion. Each of these men and women, says Chinua Akukwe, has enough resources to make a major difference in the fight against the global epidemic of H.I.V./AIDS.

Don’t Be Negative About Being Positive is a campaign that aims to fight discrimination against people living with HIV/AIDS in Zimbabwe. Since May 2005, the campaign has used personalised messages from people living positively with HIV, disseminated through television, radio and print media, to raise awareness and discourage stigma.

Claiming they lost their contracts for political reasons, three Tunisian secondary school teachers launched a hunger strike five weeks ago to compel the education ministry to restore their jobs. Attention to their protest has mounted, along with concern about their deteriorating health.

A voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) project developed in Africa has the potential to be successfully translated to the UK and could help reduce the high levels of undiagnosed HIV infection in the UK’s African community, according to research published in the December edition of Sexually Transmitted Infections.

This booklet published by UNESCO's education sector is the first in a series of publications on good practice in responding to the impact of HIV and AIDS on education. Aimed primarily at government, donor and NGO policymakers, planners and managers, the series presents ideas, research results, and policy and programmatic examples from both formal and non-formal learning environments.

New programs and policies aimed at preventing HIV in Africa should focus on providing earlier and more comprehensive sex education and reinforcing national health care systems to better serve youth, according to important new research released last week, and published by the Guttmacher Institute and institutional partners in Burkina Faso, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi and Uganda.