From June 10-12, 2009, former Boston Globe reporter John Donnelly blogged for Science Speaks live from the HIV Implementers Meeting in Windhoek, Namibia. An archive of the posts is below.
Guest blog: A scientific review of HIV/AIDS conference
June 14, 2009
Caroline Ryan is the author of this post. Ryan is Director of Program Services and Chief Technical Officer in the Office of the U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator, or the PEPFAR program.
Here is some information from the rapporteur session at the end of 2009 HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting. It covered 59 sessions and 255 presentations in… Read Full Post »
A few final thoughts
June 12, 2009
Editor’s Note: Check back on Sunday, when we expected a few more guest bloggers to weigh in with their impressions and insights from the conference.
It has been busy — and full of challenging issues.
The HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting this year in Windhoek (which ends early Sunday) has been quite different from any of the preceeding… Read Full Post »
A TB/HIV doctor’s anguish
June 12, 2009
One hot-button – but little covered – issue around AIDS is HIV/TB co-infection. In March, the World Health Organization released a report estimating one out of every four TB deaths is HIV related, or twice as many as previously believed. The report estimated 456,000 deaths of people infected with both TB and HIV.
Today, the chilling… Read Full Post »
Guest blog: Key studies on prevention
June 12, 2009
Susan Kasedde is the author of this guest blog. She is regional advisor with UNAIDS Regional Support Team for Eastern and Southern Africa.
On Thursday evening I moderated a very interesting satellite session with the title ‘Knowledge Translation and HIV Incidence Measurement’. At this session, countries reported on the results of the “Modes of HIV… Read Full Post »
Newsmaker: A view from Nigeria
June 12, 2009
Dr. John Idoko is Director General of Nigeria’s National Agency for the Control of AIDS (NACA). He started his position just three months ago. For the last 14 years, he has worked on AIDS programs, where his last job was principal investigator of the Harvard PEPFAR program in Jos – overseeing one of the largest… Read Full Post »
Guest blog:Parent to child transmission?
June 12, 2009
This guest blog was written by Smita Baruah. She is the director of government relations for the Global Health Council, the world’s largest membership alliance dedicated to saving lives by improving health throughout the globe.
In this morning’s plenary session on prevention, we learned again about the importance of involving men in all prevention programs… Read Full Post »
Guest post: Examining stigma
June 12, 2009
This guest post is written by Barbara de Zalduondo, Chief of the Programmatic Priorities Support Division with UNAIDS in Geneva. She has been involved in AIDS for more than two decades, ranging from work in Senegal and the Democratic Republic of Congo to the world of policy.
On Thursday, I moderated the session “Stigma and Discrimination.”… Read Full Post »
Guest blog: Problem-solving spirit
June 12, 2009
This is a guest blog post by Tom Walsh, who is the acting deputy global AIDS coordinator and PEPFAR’s chief of staff. Editor’s note: He wrote the guest blog on his Blackberry, which should explain some of his use of symbols in the text.
Well, John asked me to be personal, so I’m going to start […]
Tracking down HIV-positive children
June 12, 2009
It has to be one of the most boring aspects of fighting AIDS – building health systems that work.
But it’s also one of the most important.
In Zimbabwe, amid its political and economic crisis, some officials in the Ministry of Health and Child Welfare in the last two years took on a huge initiative: following up… Read Full Post »
Guest blog: Tackling taboos
June 12, 2009
This is a guest blog post by Buck Buckingham, who has been the PEPFAR country coordinator for Kenya since 2003, when the program began.
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I’m happy to see the 2009 HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting break new ground by beginning to unpack subjects that either policy makers, or activists, or funders considered off limits for far too long.
We’re… Read Full Post »
A hopeful look at HIV prevention
June 12, 2009
When it comes to the strategies of preventing HIV/AIDS, many say the world has failed. They point to daunting numbers from last year: an estimated 2.7 million new HIV infections, while 1 million were put on treatment. The race is still being lost, and it’s common to hear now that countries can’t treat their way… Read Full Post »
Saving children from HIV
June 12, 2009
Every day, 1,500 babies around the world are born with HIV.
The United States averages less than one HIV-positive baby per day.
Europe the same.
Africa averages 1,400 daily.
Every year, fewer than 7,000 HIV-positive women in the United States give birth.
Every year, 9,000 HIV-positive women in the Soweto township in South Africa give birth.
The US population: roughly 310… Read Full Post »
Getting the right test to detect treatment failure
June 11, 2009
One new scientific finding released today at the HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting: a large-scale study found CD4 tests determined correctly whether a patient was not responding to treatment only in 37 percent of the cases.
The study, presented by Phyllis Kanki, the principal investigator for Harvard’s PEPFAR programs in three African countries, found that viral load testing… Read Full Post »
Newsmaker: Kevin De Cock
June 11, 2009
Kevin De Cock, the World Health Organization’s director of HIV/AIDS programs, spoke at the opening of the HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting on Wednesday. Delegates are still talking about it. He made one dramatic warning: Some people, “no matter how unfairly,’’ may draw comparisons between AIDS treatment in the developing world today and the infamous Tuskegee study in… Read Full Post »
How to stop so many sex partners? Fataki!
June 11, 2009
Fataki!
In Swahili, it means “explosive.’’ In Tanzania, a group is using an evil character called Fataki in a mass-media campaign to slap a new ugly name to sugar daddies, older men who prey on girls and young woman for sex. The aim is to empower family and friends of young women to help them avoid… Read Full Post »
The slow uptake for male circumcision
June 11, 2009
For nearly two years after the World Health Organization recommended widespread male circumcision services in countries with high HIV prevalence rates and low circumcision among men, countries had barely begun the service.
Then Kenya, in the western province of Nyanza, began a comprehensive plan to circumcise men in November 2008. In the first six months of… Read Full Post »
A challenge to stop `wasteful spending’ in AIDS programs
June 11, 2009
While many people at the 2009 HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting have expressed concern about the global economic crisis hurting AIDS and health budgets, Stefano Bertozzi turned the focus back on AIDS programs today, which he said had too much “wasteful spending’’ and needed to be better run.
Bertozzi, executive director of the Center for Evaluation Research and… Read Full Post »
`We are entering perilous ethical waters’
June 10, 2009
At the opening ceremony tonight that launched the HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting, two noteworthy events (outside of a wonderful acaplella performance of the Namibian national anthem by the local band Vocal Motion 6 (VM6)):
Hifikepunye Pohamba, President of the Republic of Namibia, led a long delegation of senior political leaders that included the top officials in his… Read Full Post »
A few (surprising) AIDS facts from Namibia
June 10, 2009
One of the side benefits from any major global health conference is that the host country steps into the spotlight — at least for a few days.
Now is Namibia’s turn, and Dr. Norbert Foster, deputy permanent secretary at the Ministry of Health and Social Services, outlined some interesting statistics in Namibia’s fight against AIDS. Namibia… Read Full Post »
A coming AIDS treatment shortage?
June 10, 2009
So warns Fareed Abdullah, director of the Africa Unit for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, at a press conference here kicking off the HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting.
In unusually forceful language, Abdullah diverted from his prepared talking points to say that not only is there not enough money for AIDS treatment in the developing… Read Full Post »
AIDS Quilt Comes to Africa
June 10, 2009
When Dorinda Henry talks about the AIDS Quilt – the 22-year project that has so far memorialized the names of 88,000 people who have died from AIDS – she cannot help but cry.
She is not alone, of course. But Henry, the curator and chaplain of the Atlanta-based NAMES Project Foundation/AIDS Memorial Quilt, is feeling particularly… Read Full Post »
Missing Goosby
June 10, 2009
Memo to Dr. Eric Goosby: Several hundred people in Windhoek wish you were here at the HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting.
Goosby, who has been nominated by President Obama to be the next US global AIDS coordinator, yesterday had his confirmation hearing in the US Senate. There’s no timetable yet on his confirmation vote.
Ever since Obama abruptly dismissed… Read Full Post »
HIV Conference Opens with Major Funding Questions
June 10, 2009
Welcome to the live blog of the 2009 HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting, which is being held this year in Windhoek, Namibia.
For the past several days, US government officials have held internal meetings (called here “USG-only’’), but today the conference expands for the next four days with dozens of presentations involving AIDS experts from many groups.
This is… Read Full Post »
Live from Namibia: HIV Implementers Conference
June 10, 2009
This post is “sticky” – it will remain at the top of the blog until the Implementers Conference liveblogging is over. Scroll down for John Donnelly’s coverage and other posts.
From June 10-12, former Boston Globe reporter John Donnelly will be blogging live from the HIV Implementers Meeting in Windhoek, Namibia.
Please, check back during the next… Read Full Post »
Get the Latest from the HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting–Without Going to Namibia
June 8, 2009
Starting Wednesday, John Donnelly, a former reporter with the Boston Globe, will be live blogging in this space from the HIV/AIDS Implementers’ Meeting.
The conference will delve into the latest research and program innoviations on a gamut of topics–from male circumcision to HIV/TB co-infection to program planning amid the current economic uncertainty. Coming as Congress considers funding for global… Read Full Post »
Coming soon….
March 26, 2009
We will be covering the HIV Implementers Conference from Namibia at this location. Read Full Post »
I agree with the above post. Personally I cannot see why you would not want to make an effort in this regard anyway. Only the other day, at work we had exactly the same conversation and came to a similar decision