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'I'm not worried,' says 32-year-old Everine Khondeni. But as she sits down at a small wooden table in her mud-brick home in the village of Kasarika in Malawi, her expression [...]

Abstract: This study examines the importance of social science research on HIV/AIDS in Africa. There is a dearth of social science research on HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa as available literature [...]

Waver 'Frankie' L. Franklin's heart jumped when she read the letter. It was from LifeSource, a blood donor center where she had received a blood transfusion about two months earlier. [...]

There are about 4.6 million HIV positive people in India, with this number likely to spiral to 20-25 million by the end of the decade unless serious action is taken to curb it. Ashok Alexander, director of Avahan, the Bill & Melinda Gates FoundationEs Indian initiative on AIDS, discusses the organizationEs $200 million budget campaign involving the coordinated efforts of public, corporate and nonprofit organizations to address the problem before it reaches epic proportions.

Key points * AIDS is a major threat to human development. * Around 70% of people with HIV/AIDS live in sub-Saharan Africa. * Six countries will have over 25% of […]

A call is sounded for competent universal health care and treatment of the AIDS epidemic that is killing millions each year; for the need to recognize the humanity in everyone [...]

World Health Organization predicts that the number of AIDS cases will rise sharply in future, and if they prove correct, current policies will not be able to control the epidemic. The world had 611,589 AIDS cases until January 1993, with the US accounting for 40%, Africa 35%, and Asia 0.4%. The Cox Committee predicts that AIDS is spreading by heterosexual transmission from original risk groups across the UK population in general. The history and cause of AIDS particularly in the UK and US are presented. The effect of HIV, and different methods in predicting AIDS case numbers are also discussed.

Sexual activity is the leading method of transmitting the AIDS virus. The practice of safe sex is important in AIDS prevention. Risk factors for AIDS are discussed as well as treatment methods.

A study was undertaken to characterize the AIDS patients served by physicians in the Ambulatory Sentinel Practice Network (ASPN), a primary care research network that has existed since 1982. ASPN is made up of 65 medical practices and 193 physicians and serves approximately 270,000 US and Canadian patients; data from 47 practices were included in the current survey. Thirty-nine cases of AIDS were reported; of these patients, 36 were male and between 15 and 44 years old. All had at least one risk factor for AIDS. Seventeen of these patients had died at the time of the survey, which was carried out by telephone between September 1987 and May 1988, and pertained to patients treated during the preceding two years. Slightly less than one third of the practices had at least one AIDS case, and 16 of the cases were reported by 11 rural practices. These results are similar to those for AIDS cases in nonprimary care settings, and also show that the disease is more prevalent than suspected in rural areas. The fact that ASPN does not have practices in New York City and San Francisco (high-risk cities) suggests that the prevalence of AIDS in primary care practices may be higher than estimated. The limitations of the study are discussed. It is likely that primary care physicians will be increasingly called upon to counsel and treat AIDS patients; they may need to overcome barriers of knowledge, negative attitudes, and feelings of insecurity to perform these tasks effectively. (Consumer Summary produced by Reliance Medical Information, Inc.), Background. Despite the importance of the epidemic of acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS), little is known about the incidence and prevalence of AIDS in the patient population of primary care [...]

The modes of transmission of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), sexual contact and exposure to contaminated blood, are now well understood. Using mathematical optimization techniques and dynamic modeling of HIV transmission, the authors were able to give mathematical values to the epidemiologic variables that were operational during the beginning of the AIDS epidemic, which occurred among homosexual and bisexual men in San Francisco from 1978 to 1986. There are three stages of the disease: the early antigen stage; the HIV antibody-positive stage; and the AIDS stage. The early antigen stage occurs when the HIV virus is free in the blood, but no specific immune response has so far been provoked; this is thought to be the most highly infectious stage. To reach the HIV antibody-positive stage, seroconversion must take place, which is the development of an antibody response to the virus. The rate of seroconversion was able to be predicted accurately using the model when it was assumed that the infectiousness of the disease varies among the three stages of the disease. By using optimization techniques of mathematics, the number of new partners and number of risk contacts annually were estimated. These techniques were used to predict the number of new cases up to the year 1994. The authors conclude that the brief first stage of HIV infection, the early antigen phase, may have played an important part in the sudden development of the epidemic in San Francisco. This also suggests that high-risk groups should be screened for viral antigens to prevent transmission during this highly infectious stage. (Consumer Summary produced by Reliance Medical Information, Inc.)

Thailand has, at least according to available figures, the most serious AIDS problem in Asia. The spread of the disease has been explosive. The country's first AIDS case was diagnosed […]

Approximately three million women and children, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa, will die of AIDS in the 1990s, says the World Health Organization. The situation is due to social and economic factors that have put women at risk of contracting HIV infection from their husbands. Addressing the issue in a preventive manner, however, involves cultural and social changes to protect the human rights of women and alter men's behavior.

ATLANTA -- Images USA said it recently launched an informational campaign called 'Pause,' an acronym for Promoting Awareness of HIV Using Safer-Sex Education. The shop said it has partnered with [...]

The United Nations has designated this year, for the first time since 1990, the International Year of Women with HIV and Aids. A staggering 19 million women are now affected [...]

As millions of people mark World AIDS Day, the statistics seem gloomier than ever. But the global fight against the disease is steadily gaining strength IN THE modern world, 20 [...]

Twenty years on, the fight against AIDS is not going well IT IS 20 years since clinical reports of a new and deadly immunological disorder, now known as AIDS, first [...]

IN A rundown bus park in central Lagos, a man with a microphone begins a patter of jokes that gathers a small crowd. He pulls one man from the mass [...]

PRETORIA, South Africa -- Over three dozen pharmaceutical firms have dropped a lawsuit challenging a South African law that was passed several years ago to help bring more generic drugs [...]

South African President Thabo Mbeki has finally articulated what millions of Africans have been thinking for quite a long time. Is HIV really the cause of AIDS in Africa and […]

The New Brunswick Telegraph Journal for January 31, 2000, carried a picture of a priest behind the altar, with arms outstretched like the arms of the risen Christ on a […]

The good news on AIDS this year is that the overall mortality rate from the disease has fallen in the United States an unprecedented 47 percent from 1996 to 1997, [...]