Tag: HIV

Categories : COVID HIVTags :

Many HIV Deaths in Africa Due to Interrupted Care

On By ModernMedia

An article written for The Conversation explores the reasons why, in an era of antiretroviral therapy (ART), so many people around the world are still dying of HIV.

Despite fierce resistance under Thabo Mbeku’s leadership, ART became widely available in South Africa. Yet in 2019, despite the world’s largest ART programme with 71% coverage, there were still 72 000 HIV-related deaths in South Africa. 

Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) supports hospitals across Africa in treating people with HIV, but because patients present with advanced HIV up to a third die during their hospital stay.

HIV is a lifelong disease, and requires lifelong treatment. Some struggle to take tablets on a daily basis, risking drug resistance.

People with advanced HIV now typically have interrupted or failing treatment. MSF-funded studies in Kenya and the DRC showed that only 20-35% of patients with advanced HIV had never received ART.

The “Welcome Back Services” provided by Medecins Sans Frontieres in Khayelitsha, Cape Town are an example of getting patients who have lapsed back into care.

In deprived settings, TB is the leading cause of death for people with HIV, along with cryptococcal meningitis and bacterial infection. These are all treatable if caught in time; cryptococcal meningitis effectively has a zero survival rate but mortality can be reduced by 40% when treated with flucytosine and amphotericin B. By testing patients before they reach the stage where hospitalisation is necessary, survival rates can be greatly improved.

Categories : HIVTags :

Eradication of Polio in Africa Boosted Public Health

On By ModernMedia

A story in Medical Xpress discusses the eradication of polio in Africa – officially declared polio-free on August 2020 – and how the campaign for its elimination reaped many other side benefits for public healthcare on the continent.

Polio, alongside smallpox which has now been eradicated worldwide, is one of the great success stories of vaccination: 350 000 people were paralysed by polio in 1988, and in 2019 only 175 people were.

The current effort started in 1996, when African heads of state resolved to eliminate polio on the African continent, and Nelson Mandela launched the “Kick Polio out of Africa” campaign. Collaborations between all sectors of civil society came together to achieve the goal. Vaccination is followed up with surveillance – 3 consecutive disease-free years are needed to certify eradication in an area. Polio was close to eradication 20 years ago, but vaccine hesitancy – a key concern for future COVID vaccination – was spread by misinformation and undermined the efforts.

Africa now has stronger public health systems thanks to the investments made, and developments such as new innovations to deliver vaccines and a renewed demand for vaccine services.