GLOBAL: AIDS funding at "dangerous turning point"
5 November 2009 (PlusNews ), Wavering international support for HIV/AIDS efforts is resulting in funding shortfalls that could wipe out a decade of progress in rolling out AIDS treatment, the international medical and humanitarian organization, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), has warned.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86902
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SWAZILAND: TB-HIV services needed to lower world's highest rates
4 November 2009 (PlusNews ), Swaziland not only has the world's highest HIV prevalence rate, it now also has the highest tuberculosis (TB) rate, but health officials warn that not enough is being done to integrate TB and HIV services.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86879
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BOTSWANA: Katlego Lally, "Being a teenager is very hard"
4 November 2009 (PlusNews ), Katlego Lally*, 17, belongs to a club for HIV-positive teenagers run by the Baylor Children's Clinic Centre of Excellence in Gaborone, Botswana's capital. She talked to IRIN/PlusNews about how the club has helped her overcome feelings of isolation and depression.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86881
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KENYA: Cervical cancer, little-known killer of HIV-positive women
3 November 2009 (PlusNews ), Three years after being diagnosed with HIV, Alice Mworia, 28, went for a routine medical check-up during which she told the nurse she had noticed an unusual vaginal discharge; a test revealed she had pre-cancerous lesions on her cervix that could develop into cancer if untreated.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86853
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BOTSWANA: Positive teens find refuge at their own club
3 November 2009 (PlusNews ), Raging hormones, peer pressure and coming to terms with a changing body image - growing up is difficult enough without the added burden of living with HIV, and keeping it hidden from friends and classmates.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86861
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ZIMBABWE: Anna Matopodza, "When I tell people I am a grandmother, they do not believe me"
2 November 2009 (PlusNews ), When Anna Matopodza, 55, from a village in the Buhera district of Manicaland Province, Zimbabwe, found out she was HIV-positive, she was anxious about who would look after her five children when she died. The thought of death haunted her for months; then she joined dance group and travelled around the world, teaching people about HIV/AIDS through song and dance.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86834
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ETHIOPIA: Bright lights, big city is high risk for students
2 November 2009 (PlusNews ), Being a university freshman is an exciting time for any young person, but many students get carried away, partying too hard and taking sexual risks.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86837
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GLOBAL: AIDS activists laud lifting of US HIV travel ban
2 November 2009 (PlusNews ), A 22-year-old ban on people infected with HIV entering the US was officially lifted on 2 November, with the new rules taking effect in 60 days. AIDS activists have hailed the move as a major coup in the fight against stigma.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86840
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LESOTHO: Time to talk about sex and HIV
2 November 2009 (PlusNews ), Having more than one sexual relationship at the same time is driving the spread of HIV in small landlocked Lesotho. The health sector has long suspected this, but a new report by the National AIDS Commission (NAC), in partnership with UNAIDS and the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, has confirmed it.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86842
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NAMIBIA: A long walk to universal access
30 October 2009 (PlusNews ), In Onamutenya village, northern Namibia, the Shigwedha household leaves their homestead at the crack of dawn to make the monthly four-hour walk to fetch antiretroviral (ARV) medication from the local clinic.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86812
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MOZAMBIQUE: Task-shifting brings rapid scale-up of ART rollout
30 October 2009 (PlusNews ), The use of mid-level health workers rather than doctors to prescribe antiretroviral treatment (ART), a strategy called task-shifting, has enabled Mozambique to triple the number of facilities providing medication within six months, according to a new study.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86813
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AFRICA: Using DOTS for TB, HIV and other chronic diseases
29 October 2009 (PlusNews ), Malawi's successful use of a well-known tuberculosis (TB) treatment system to scale up antiretroviral treatment (ART) for HIV could improve chronic disease management in other African nations, experts say.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86792
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TANZANIA: Low uptake of ARVs hampering universal access
27 October 2009 (PlusNews ), HIV-positive Tanzanians are not taking advantage of the availability of life-prolonging anti-retroviral medication in hospitals around the country, says a senior government official.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86756
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SWAZILAND: Thandi Xaba, "If you feel good about life it helps you stay healthy"
27 October 2009 (PlusNews ), Thandi Xaba, 23, an aspiring actress living with HIV, belongs to an itinerant theatrical group in Swaziland who perform plays dealing with HIV/AIDS, often spiced with humour to engage the rural audience who sit beneath trees to watch the shows.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86767
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AFRICA: Electronic records can streamline health care
27 October 2009 (PlusNews ), Replacing manual data with electronic health records would significantly improve the quality of care and enable African HIV treatment programmes to be scaled up more efficiently, say the authors of a new article on the subject.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86768
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GLOBAL: AIDS funding debate heats up
26 October 2009 (PlusNews ), The billions of donor dollars spent on combating HIV/AIDS in the last decade, often at the expense of other fatal diseases, have done little to strengthen weak national health systems, some global health experts argue.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86754
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ETHIOPIA: Increased condom use among sex workers but more education needed
23 October 2009 (PlusNews ), With non-skilled jobs in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, paying as little as US$16 per month, the financial incentives to engage in commercial sex work are overwhelming - earning 30 times a domestic worker’s salary.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86718
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GLOBAL: HIV vaccine trial results raise more questions
22 October 2009 (PlusNews ), The recent news that for the first time an HIV vaccine had shown some protective effect generated widespread excitement, until it emerged that the results were based on the most promising of three different analyses of the trial findings.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86685
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SOUTHERN AFRICA: Life insurance for HIV-positive people, at a price
22 October 2009 (PlusNews ), The availability of antiretroviral (ARV) treatment and legislation prohibiting discrimination have helped turn HIV/AIDS into just another chronic disease, but an HIV-positive status can still be an obstacle to getting a loan or buying insurance.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86698
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SWAZILAND: Controversy over calls to legalise sex work
21 October 2009 (PlusNews ), A search for ways to curb the spread of HIV in Swaziland has led to a public debate on legalizing sex work, which would have been unheard of 10 years ago in this poor, food-insecure country.
http://www.plusnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=86667
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