The common reason they give is that the man cannot leave them for someone else after infecting them with HIV.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Agnes Banda’s story may somehow be different but she says when she was getting divorced, her husband told her not to mention that she was HIV positive – a move she says disadvantaged her.

Banda, 39, and a teacher at one of the schools in Lusaka says she got married in 2002.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“We started co-habiting in 2000 when I was still in Western Province and in 2002, that’s when we got married officially. Before we got married there was a time I came to visit him from Kaoma and I found some capsules in one of the pockets of his clothes. I wasn’t familiar with them so I later asked him what they were for. He told me that he had some genital rashes, an STI (Sexually Transmitted Infection) and he was prescribed the medicine,” she says. “He went on to say that before he could take the capsules, he consulted another nurse and she said it was just a mere rash but I still wasn’t convinced, but we got married anyway.”home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

She says in 2004, her husband got very sick and lost a lot of weight.

“He was just like a moving skeleton. He used to have night sweats and at that time, he was doing nothing so I had to run around and look for money. He had insisted on going to the hospital alone. So I went for work and when I came back. he said ‘Aggie banipeza nili HIV positive’ (Aggie, they have found me HIV positive) but I think after seeing the fear in me, he withdrew the statement and said ‘Mwandi bani chita chabe advise kuyenda kupimisa VCT’ (no they have just advised me to go for VCT voluntary counsellig testing). home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kitSo I asked him if he had done VCT. He said ‘no’, then I asked why, the response I got was that because of his illness his immunity was low and could have mistook that for HIV. So he said that he would go when he got better. He was put on medication and he got better,” she says.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Banda says when her husband recovered, she reminded him to go for a test but he refused, saying that the virus could not survive in his blood.

“That was a wake-up call for me but I was scared I couldn’t go alone because I was thinking how I could receive the news if I was found positive. I feared to say if I go there and I am found positive, he could have accused me of infidelity. So life continued and I lived in fear,” she says.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

She says in October, 2006, fate caught up with her and she started feeling sick.
“It was during the elections and I was feeling like I had malaria. My legs were painful, very painful. I used to sit on the table verifying results and after I got money from the elections, I used it all on medication,” she says.

Banda says while she was sick, her husband left her and went to Malawi to do business.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

She says while he was in Malawi, her illness progressed and her health deteriorated.

“Even after using all the money, I started going to other clinics even government clinics but all in vain. Then one day I just thought of going to UTH, without a referral. The doctor saw me and saw the seriousness of my illness. He asked for a close relative since I had just gone there with a friend. At the hospital, they said there was need for either for a mother or husband to come,” she says.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Banda says since her husband was out of the country, she called her mother who found her critically ill.

She says her mother told her to tell the husband to come back from Malawi.

“He came back with some money which he spent on me and I appreciate that but after trying this and that nothing worked or improved until one day a certain doctor at UTH decided for me and the family. I was in no decision making position. I couldn’t walk. I was being lifted around and I believe that God spoke through that doctor,” she says.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Banda says the doctor decided that she does an HIV test because all the tests were done and nothing came out.

She says the test was done and it came out positive.

“I thank God that the test was done because if it was not for that, I would have been gone and forgotten. When the test was done, the CD4 count was initially low, it was 135. So I was immediately put on ARVs and within the shortest period of time, I started recovering,” she says.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Banda says when she started getting better, her husband started complaining about the money he had used on her.

“I thought he was giving me money out of love and he talked about it until it became a thorn in the bush. He complained that couldn’t I have gotten sick for a short time and gotten better. I couldn’t bear this any more so, I had to find a way to get back the money he spent on me which he accepted,” she says.

Banda says she got a loan and gave him K3 million and upon giving him the money, he told her that she should not expect him to buy anything at home or pay the rent until he declares profits.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Banda says things were not easy for her as she had to cope with her HIV status as well.

“I discovered immune boosters in his pockets… then the bank was deducting money from me and I was given full responsibility of the home. This went on for months and even before I could finish the loan…I had a lot of debts because of the loan, he said that we divorce,” she says.

She says her husband told her that he could not continue with her and if he had to build a house, her relatives would grab the house thinking they had used her money.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“So that’s how we got divorced on 10th May 2008. On September 3, I took him to court and we got divorced officially but unfortunately, I wasn’t open about my status. I wasn’t open because I wasn’t counselled. We did not have any children together,” she says.

Banda says her husband was not supposed to divorce her because she tested positive in his home.

She suspected that her husband might have known because he was taking boosters.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“Maybe if I had mentioned that I was positive at the time in court, the court could have told him to be maintaining me. He told me not to mention in the courts that I was positive. He brought me from Kaoma to Lusaka where life is expensive. I need help. I need a house and I am finding it difficult to work. My husband refused to go for a test because he used to say that it’s voluntary so he could not be forced,” she says.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Banda says she told her relatives about her status but he never mentioned anything to his.

She says at that time, she felt rejected and a misfit and that no one counted her as a person.

Banda says she used to feel as if people knew about her status.

“I received counselling from call centres and I accepted my status and I now talk about it openly. My CD4 count is now 820 as of January this year and I thank God for that. But I think he knew about his status and even when I was sick, he refused to go and get tested saying it was voluntary and that he would do it at his own time,” she says.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

She says she has now come to terms with her status and has accepted it.

Banda says she even has a club at the school where she teaches but finds it difficult to talk to the teachers.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

A No, I do not. First, prostate issues cause problems with the urinary system, not the bowels. Second, prostate cancer does not occur at age 19. According to the Jamaica Cancer Society, nearly all cases occur among the over-45s.

So why are you bleeding?

Well, statistically speaking, the likeliest reason for a young guy to bleed from the bottom is piles.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Piles (also known as haemorrhoids) are varicose veins in the rectum. This means that the veins are ‘bulging’ and are liable to bleed when under pressure.

Piles are extremely common. Experts think they are at least partly caused by a poor diet.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

If you do have piles, don’t be scared. Most people who get this condition do not have to undergo surgery. Very often, the disorder can be controlled by medication and diet.

I must stress that there could be other reasons why you have been bleeding. See a doc now. Good luck.

Q I am a 20-year-old woman. About two weeks ago, I had sex with my boyfriend. The condom fell off. He decided that he wanted to go ahead without the condom, but I disagreed. So he stayed inside for only about a minute or less. My period came a couple of days after that. Now I have an awful smelly discharge. What do you think I should do? Is it serious?home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

A On the night the condom fell off, you were absolutely right to insist that your boyfriend stop. However, it is a pity that he continued for around a minute.

Nevertheless, it does seem you are not pregnant, because you say that your menses arrived.

Now you have an offensive discharge. The first thing that occurs to me is this: When the condom came off, did it by any chance remain inside you? A ‘retained’ condom is a well-known cause of a smelly discharge.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

However, let us assume that you had both found the condom. In that case, the likeliest reason for that offensive discharge is a vaginal infection.

You may well have caught the infection during that brief minute of unprotected sex.

It is absolutely essential that you consult a doctor. She can examine you internally, take test samples from the region of your cervix, and reach a diagnosis.

Until you have seen the doc and been diagnosed, do not have sex.

Q I am a man in my early 20s. Around nine months ago, I was in a relationship with another man. I am not gay, but did it for financial reasons, which I know was wrong. What I am worried about is that I have recently failed a blood examination. So I am now wondering if I have contracted HIV. Do you think it was HIV which caused me to fail? But if I had HIV, would I have been seeing signs of it by now?home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

A Sorry to hear about your problems. But what I do not understand is this. What do you mean when you say that you ‘failed’ a blood test?

What blood test was it? And why did you have it done? If it was for HIV, I would have thought that whoever did the test would have told you so.

It seems clear that you should now go back to whoever conducted that blood examination and ask them to explain what sort of test it was. It may just have been a blood count for anaemia. Or possibly it was a ’sickling’ test.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

In the part of your email which I have not published, you told me precisely what you did with this other guy. I regret to say that this particular activity could have been enough to give you HIV if the other man was infected.

You should take an HIV test. The fact that you have not had any symptoms does not mean you are OK. Get this matter sorted out right away.

Q I’m a 19-year-old female who has had two miscarriages, both at five months. I have a problem with my weight, which is 190 pounds. I want to lose about 30 pounds, but I’m really depressed about everything, including the two miscarriages, and being unemployed. I really need advice on how to start losing weight without getting depressed.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

A You have obviously had a bad time lately. Many people do not realise how stressful a miscarriage can be for a woman. To have two in succession is extremely distressing. You don’t say whether you are in a sexual relationship at the moment. But if you are, I would suggest that you use a good contraceptive method for a year or so, so that you are not exposed to the strain of a further pregnancy, plus the worry of wondering whether you might miscarry again. It is clear that you are quite depressed, so I urge you to see a doctor as soon as possible. home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kitIt is likely that she will put you on an antidepressant to help you get through this difficult time. On the point of losing weight, do not attempt to lose it quickly! Very strict dieting would probably make you even more depressed. Instead, a reasonable target would be to lose the 30 pounds over, say, the next two and a half years! That is a target of only one pound per month, which is achievable without making yourself miserable. A sensible free diet sheet is available at www.health24.com/dietnfood/weight.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Q Can one die from a heart attack during sex, as I have heard?

A Such things do occasionally happen in elderly people, particularly if they already have heart trouble. But if you are a young person, you really need not fret about this.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Abdel Maldonado, 35, of the 100 block of Home Avenue, is charged with aggravated sexual assault, sexual assault and endangering the welfare of a child for the alleged abuse that started in 2005 when the boy was 12, prosecutors said.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

The abuse allegedly continued until 2006.

A positive HIV test led the then-16-year-old boy and his mother to report the abuse to police.

The teen reported three assaults starting when he was 12, but the defendant said he had consensual relations with the victim 55 times beginning when he was 9, prosecutors said.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Maldonaldo is being held in the Mercer County workhouse on $300,000 bail, said Casey DeBlasio, spokeswoman with the county prosecutor’s office.

“I guarantee you some of them had diseases that could be transmitted”, this friend of James tells IUC. The biker friend also expressed his concern for Sandra Bullocks health and well being because James could have brought a disease home to his wife if he indeed did contract one.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Jesse James’ mistresses have been very forth coming in their interviews about James’ habit of having unprotected sex. This would only stand to reason that it is possible a communicable disease can be contracted by James and then by Bullock. There is also a chance that it has not happened too. The friend says it is just better to be safe and know for sure.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

If this biker is such a good friend of James’, wouldn’t it have been a more friend like gesture to express your concerns about HIV and STD’s in person, or at least in a private phone call. I cannot imagine “a close friend” expressing his concerns via the media. That close friend should soon be an ex-friend.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Whether James and Bullock have or have not contracted any type of diseases due to James’ sexual encounters is something we will never know, and we really don’t need to know this. Some things need to stay private. The public is not stupid, they already knew that it was a possibility after all the reports of the unprotected sex with strippers and porn stars. I am sure Sandra Bullock realized this very early on too. I cannot imagine that a good friend would go public to make sure James and Bullock took this into consideration. home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

It is amazing all the “good friends” that come out during a media frenzy to spill the dirt, or in this case to spill the dirt but under the umbrella of “concern”. With friends like these you do not need enemies. home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

The device, which will prototypes of which will cost only $250 to build, can return a result in just 10 minutes. In contrast with the large machines currently used for HIV testing in most hospitals, large flow cytometers that cost “a hundred times more” than the inexpensive prototype, the use of lasers cuts down on cost and size:home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

The device works by measuring the reflection of a laser beam off a small sample of blood. Depending on the density of T-white blood cells, a key indicator for the presence and progress of HIV, the laser will scatter differently.

PARC is hopeful that if the device comes to market that it will “empower” doctors in poorer, more rural places heavily affected by AIDS. PARC isn’t the only company trying to simplify HIV testing either- a number of other companies are trying to develop and market handheld HIV testing devices:home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

(Peter) Kiesel is competing against a dozen other groups vying to fill the need for cheap, portable CD4 tests. Other technologies have been under development for years, including a half-dozen recent projects funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation that include disposable CD4 tester kits as easy to use as a home pregnancy test. Kiesler’s laboratory-tested device is a couple of years behind these projects, some of which have been tested in the field in African countries.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Japanese electronics firm Sony will be teaming up this summer with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) in a campaign to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

The United Nations have decided to make MDGs (Millenium Development Goals) to be achieved in the next five years. Those goals include to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger, to establish universal primary education, to promote gender equality, to reduce child mortality, to improve maternal health, to ensure environmental sustainability, and of course stopping the rise of HIV and AIDS, as well as malaria and other diseases.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

The partnership campaign, called “Public Viewing in Africa” will see Sony provide screens, video projectors, Blu-ray disc players, and other equipments necessary for the public viewing of games in 12 cities of Cameroon and Ghana, between June 13th and July 11th.

As a side show of the games, Sony will be offering AIDS/HIV testing, free condoms and counselling in areas where awareness is the most important. There will also be HIV testings made in both countries. As well as quizz shows and loal plays.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Even though hugely popular sport, football cannot be seen often in the targeted areas that are characterized by low rates of household TV penetration (22 percent in Cameroon, and 21 percent in Ghana) with many people unable to watch football matches on TV and support their home country. Cameroon and Ghana are both qualified for the next World Cup in South Africa.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

By conducting the joint project during the biggest sporting event of the year, the World Cup, the partners aim to attract approximately 13,000 participants, and ensure there are approximately 1,800 recipients of HIV tests.

”Sony, as a global leader of network, consumer electronics and entertainment, will provide people in Africa and all over the world new entertainment experiences for the world’s top-level football games,” said Sony Chairman Howard Stringer.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“The World Cup brings people together, both as teams, and as nations cheering on their players. The same can be true for the Millennium Development Goals. There can be no spectators in the fight against poverty. Everyone has a role to play in scoring the 8 Millennium Development Goals, which if reached would improve the quantity and quality of life for many hundreds of millions of people across developing countries.” said UNDP Administrator Helen Clark.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“FIFA World Cup 2010 in South Africa is a wonderful opportunity to reaffirm the world’s solidarity with Africa. Sony, UNDP and JICA together will take a step forward to open the door to be closer to Africa. Collaborative efforts between people in Africa and all over the world are indispensable to bring about global peace and prosperity.” said JICA President, Sadako Ogata.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

As part of the campaign, Sony will launch a website “Earth F.C.” that will donate one ball for every 1,000 clicks to African children.

Infectious syphilis rose 45 percent in the city last year, with far greater increases among women – a group whose reported cases, while still small, barely registered until recently.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“It is very disturbing to see these outbreaks among women,” said Jo Valentine, chief of syphilis elimination and STD disparities at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Local health officials have tamped down a handful of similar eruptions around the country in the last few years, Valentine said. But a 34 percent cut in state HIV funding for the city beginning July 1 – some of the money is already gone – could hamper efforts in Philadelphia, home to more than half the HIV patients in Pennsylvania.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

The $2 million was used for HIV testing and prevention in minority communities, which have the highest rates of sexually transmitted diseases nationwide. It would have covered tests for an estimated 8,000 people next year, and prevention and risk-reduction services for 4,000.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

All state-funded support groups aimed at prevention have already ceased to operate.

Danielle M. Parks leads a five-week risk-reduction program for heterosexual black women. The health educator’s final session of SISTA – Sisters Informing Sisters about Topics on AIDS, which reached 136 women last year – was two weeks ago.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“These women need this,” Parks said, because otherwise “they are going to continue life as usual.”

During her last group, she told students about women who had recently tested positive for HIV. One was a 43-year-old Latina whose husband of 16 years, it turned out, had been aware of his infection for three years but did not know how to tell his wife. Another was a 36-year-old African American mother of three with private insurance and a college degree.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“It doesn’t matter if you have been in a relationship for three months or 30 months,” Parks told them. “Just having sex with someone who is African American puts you at higher risk, because the rates within the community are so high.”

Syphilis is spread through skin-to-skin sexual contact and thus is more infectious than HIV, which is passed in bodily fluids. But they follow similar patterns, and tactics employed to prevent one often do the same for the other. Testing is considered the prime strategy.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“When people learn their status and it is positive, their behavior changes,” said David S. Metzger, an HIV prevention researcher at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. Even if the test is negative, he said, “just the consideration of infection helps people to practice safer behaviors.”

STD rates are driven in part by an economic downturn that is leaving more people without insurance. And some women who are already living on the edge are more likely to barter with their bodies.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“People will have sex in order to stay in an apartment or house, basically survival sex,” Metzger said.

Then there’s fading memory. AIDS is no longer a death sentence, and as syphilis declined through the 1990s and the early 2000s, risky behaviors have increased, experts say. This is especially true for heterosexuals, who typically do not consider themselves to be in danger.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Blacks are eight times as likely as whites to be found to have primary and secondary syphilis, the key infectious stages; Latinos are four times as likely, according to the CDC.

Men are five times as likely to be infected as women. The category “men who have sex with men” (MSM), which reflects behavior rather than self-identity, accounts for roughly two-thirds of cases here and nationally.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Rates in all groups had risen through 2008, the most recent year for which national data are available.

The biggest jump in Philadelphia’s 2009 statistics is based on the smallest numbers: women ages 15 to 29 went from five cases to 23. But those are key childbearing years, and infection during pregnancy can cause congenital syphilis.

“A single case is tragic,” said Lenore Asbel, an infectious disease specialist in the Philadelphia Department of Public Health’s STD clinic.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Ms. George’s first child died at 13 months, likely due to HIV infection, and the Lesotho Ministry of Health is working to ensure that her second baby is not born with HIV as well.

In 2007, the Government, with help from UNICEF and other partners, initiated a massive effort to improve the country’s Prevention of Mother-to-Child Transmission (PMTCT) services. To succeed, they needed to ensure that every clinic in the country could provide HIV testing and treatment.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Lesotho leads the way

Lesotho became one of the first countries in the region to allow nurses to administer anti-retroviral (ARV) treatments, which greatly expanded access to these critical interventions in the remote areas of the country where fewer doctors are available.

But despite such efforts, major challenges remain, including the fact that many women, like Ms. George, are likely to make only one clinic visit. home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

This is a typical problem for many health systems in Africa. Though ARV drugs can increase the chances that a baby is born free of the virus, providing HIV-positive mothers with the treatment is not easy, especially in remote areas. The combination of distance, lack of transport and poverty prevents many women from making regular antenatal care visits. Such factors also lead many women to drop out of the PMTCT programmes, and to deliver their babies at home without the presence of trained medical professionals.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

In a country such as Lesotho, where one in four people is living with HIV, that one antenatal visit has become all the more critical.

Keeping mother and child healthy

Innovative prevention methods are also making a huge difference. The Lesotho Government has designed a minimum package for expectant mothers like Ms. George that includes the most effective ARV drugs and antibiotics needed to keep them, and their children, healthy. When they leave the clinic, these women are also provided with clear instructions on what medicines they need to take – and when – and what medicines they need to give to their babies after their birth.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

In an effort to expand this public health innovation ever further, UNICEF and WHO have created a colour-coded take-home box that will be rolled out to five countries in eastern and southern Africa, Lesotho included, by July. Instead of the nurses having to pack the medicines all in small pill bags, this new ‘Mother to Baby Pack’ clearly separates the ARV drugs and the antibiotics according to when they need to be taken. home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“We had to take advantage of the first antenatal visit,” said UNICEF HIV and Maternal Health Expert Blandinah Motaung. “In case a woman delivers at home, she will have that package with her.”

A dramatic drop in infections

With the new regimen of ARV treatments, and the efforts to facilitate women in taking these medicines at home, health experts expect the number of babies born with HIV in Lesotho to drop dramatically. home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“The expectation is that with better adherence to the treatment and more focus on helping mothers to exclusively breastfeed for six months, we can further reduce the transmission rate to less than five per cent,” said Ms. Motaung.

Take home medicine

After her check-up, Ms. George listened carefully to Marethabile Lelia, the clinic nurse, give instructions on the medicines that she would be carrying home, and a mother-to-mother counsellor reiterated the importance of sticking to her treatment.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Although Ms. George has another appointment scheduled at the clinic, Ms. Lelia doesn’t expect to see her until she returns with a six-week-old for the baby’s first round of immunizations and first HIV test – children are again tested at 12, and then 18 months.

As she prepared for her five-hour walk home, Ms. George clung to her medicines, understanding clearly they represented her best hope of ensuring that her baby would escape infection and grow up healthy.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Dessaix had planning to attend the Shanghai International Literary Festival and also had been invited to speak in Beijing and Chengdu.

China’s travel ban dates back to the 1980s when the HIV epidemic first emerged in the country. It now has one of the fastest growing HIV epidemics in the world. home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Dessaix was reported to be “humiliated” and “insulted” by the refusal of the Chinese authorities to grant him entry.

Regulations state that all short-term visitors to the country must state that they are HIV-negative. Those planning stays of six months or longer in China are required to have an HIV test.

A temporary waiver was issued in 2008 to allow people with HIV to attend the Beijing Olympics. It was understood that the country’s health ministry aimed to fully repeal the ban in time for a trade exposition that opens in Shanghai on May 1st this year. home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Over 90 Australian literary figures have signed an open letter protesting at the decision of the Chinese authorities to forbid Dessaix to enter the country because of his HIV infection.

Meanwhile, the announcement by the South Korean government that it has lifted its country’s restrictions on entry by HIV-positive foreign nationals has been described as an “empty gesture”. No legislation has been put in place to make the change legally binding. home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Indeed, a bill is currently before the country’s national assembly which calls for the mandatory HIV testing of all foreigners hoping to work in the country. The draft legislation has its origins in anti-western feeling in South Korea promoted by the Spectrum group which has sought to portray foreigners as HIV-infected, child abusers and sexual predators. The preamble of the bill states: “”Nowadays, the number of foreigners working in Korea is increasing, but a good many have previous convictions for drug and sexual crimes or carry infectious diseases.”home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Today, despite the progress made in research, about 60 per cent of HIV-infected patients are still not treated.

“I’m very furious,” said the 2008 Nobel Prize of Medicine winner. “I’m furious also to see that people are discriminated (against).”

The self-described “scientist-activist” also lamented that “we will not reach the (global) objective of universal access to treatment by 2010″.

In Singapore’s case, “the stigma, the fact that they (people) have to pay everything, it’s the worst condition for stimulating people to be tested and treated”, said Professor Barre-Sinoussi.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Free testing, free treatment

Prof Barre-Sinoussi, who was at the Biopolis last week to share her latest research findings on natural protection against Aids, said she was initially impressed with Singapore’s “wonderful facilities”. “Then, I rebalanced my positive view,” she said.

Singapore’s proportion of new HIV cases – there were 456 in 2008 and 423 in 2007 – to the general population is “a little more” compared to France, said the research director. Throw in “stigma and discrimination” – the No 1 barrier to tackling HIV/Aids – and the figures are probably under-reported, she said.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“Coming from a country (France) where everything is free, this is difficult to accept,” she added.

“HIV, like cancer, is a very severe deadly disease and should be considered as 100 per cent free for patients,” she stressed.

When contacted, the Ministry of Health (MOH) agreed that the stigma of HIV was “still prevalent” here.

It is working to encourage greater acceptance of people with HIV. home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

But MOH pointed out that unlike France, where the state-funded healthcare system “means a higher tax burden”, Singapore’s approach of “heavy Government subsidies and co-payment” allowed for affordable healthcare without heavy taxes.

“Like all other patients, HIV/Aids patients have access to subsidised … care,” said MOH. Patients here can use Medisave and Medifund.

HIV prevalance among Singapore residents is “similar” to other developed nations, said MOH. home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

It was about 0.1 to 0.2 per cent last year, while UNAIDS 2008 figures showed France’s HIV prevalence at 0.4 per cent.

MOH said it had “expected” that more HIV-infected people would be discovered as MOH encouraged testing. Over half of 2008’s new cases had late-stage HIV infection.

But what is the cost to the economy when young people who should be working die, asked Prof Barre-Sinoussi, suggesting that Singapore conduct studies to determine the cost. “The answer (in similar studies) was clearly in favour of access to free treatment,” she said.

Action for Aids’ executive director Lionel Lee said free treatment subjects the healthcare system to abuses and “may not translate to long-term economic benefits” because of the side effects of HIV medication.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

The AIDS Healthcare Foundation/Magic Johnson Testing America Tour arrived in Columbia on Wednesday and is offering free tests to anyone who is interested for two days this week.

The tests are given in their new state-of-the-art mobile facility that can be found at Lewis Scott Court in Eastover from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Thursday.

The six month tour, that will span 48 states when completed, hopes to provide awareness about the importance of testing in addition to the free testing facility.

The South Carolina HIV/AIDS Council has teamed up with the AHF to provide local support.

According to a report done in 2007 by the Centers for Disease Control, South Carolina is home to over 14,000 residents infected with AIDS.  That’s 1.4 percent of the national total.

Source: midlandsconnect.com

Furthermore household members of index patients who tested HIV positive were 54% less likely to accept VCT (voluntary counselling and testing) than household members of patients who tested negative, and 78% less likely if the index patient had been tested at home.

The researchers suggest that this is not because HIV was explicitly discussed in households with an HIV-positive member, and people were afraid to test, but rather the opposite: the stigma of HIV meant that HIV testing was less likely to be discussed and normalised in households both where someone did have HIV, and in households where someone did not have HIV but feared they did.

The researchers conclude that “community-level interventions are needed to mitigate the effects of HIV stigma” in order to improve VCT rates and address a situation where the very people more likely to have HIV are those less likely to take a test.

Reference
Charlebois E et al. Impact of anticipated and actual HIV status on referral and acceptance of household testing in Kampala, Uganda. 17th Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections, San Francisco, abstract 1008, 2010.

Source: Aidsmap

It also found that those who thought they had HIV were significantly less likely to refer members of their household for HIV testing than those who did not think so.

And it found that if a study member did test HIV-positive, members of their household were much less likely to accept the offer of an HIV test than members of households with no HIV-positive member.

The survey was jointly conducted by researchers from the University of California, San Francisco and Makerere University, Uganda.

The study enrolled 419 patients of unknown HIV status who presented for tuberculosis (TB) evaluation at the Uganda National TB and Leprosy Control Agency in Kampala, Uganda, because their household included someone with active TB. Further details of the study can be viewed on the Makerere University website here.

The patients were part of a study that randomised HIV testing of the patient and members of their household to on-site testing at the TB clinic or to home-based testing by mobile health workers.

Before receiving their test result (in either setting), index patients were asked what they anticipated the result would be and how willing they were to refer other household members for clinic-based or home-based testing.

After they received the result, other household members were asked how willing they were to accept an HIV test (regardless of whether the test result was disclosed).

Most participants were male (62%) and their mean age was 31. Just over 40% of participants were married, just under 40% never had been, and the remaining 20% were separated or widowed.

The first striking finding was that far more participants thought they had HIV than actually did. The actual HIV prevalence in the group was 19% (80 individuals), but fully two-thirds of the group (276 individuals) anticipated a positive result. In fact:

• 18% correctly assumed they were HIV-positive

• 33% correctly assumed they were HIV-negative

• Only 1.4% of the group thought they were HIV-negative when they in fact had HIV

• 48% of the group thought they were HIV-positive when they did not have HIV.

Source: Aidsmap

This is Regan Hofmann, who has been living with HIV for 14 years.

Hofmann grew up in Princeton, N.J., and graduated from the private, co-ed Princeton Day School and Trinity College in Hartford, CT. Soon after, she married and moved to Atlanta, GA, with her husband, where she was hoping to find a writing job. Then the marriage failed.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

After her divorce at 28, Hofmann started dating a man.

“I had sex without a condom twice,” she says.

She never imagined her boyfriend was HIV positive.

“He seemed so clean and safe. He had a nice family. He sang to me and let me drive the boat, with his arms wrapped protectively around my shoulders, when we went waterskiing,” she said.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

He was the kind of man she’d bring home to her family. She didn’t know that he had a sore on his leg that would not heal. He did not know the implications of his sore.

But Hofmann knew that shortly after unprotected sex – when she and her boyfriend were in the process of breaking up – she had a swollen lymph node in her upper leg. She went to the doctor, who gave her an HIV test.

He gave her the results with these words: “I don’t know how to tell you this, so I am just going to tell you. Your blood work shows that you are HIV-positive. I am so sorry.”home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Back then, Hofmann considered HIV a death sentence. But instead of “planning for my impending death and a graceful demise with a service of song, dance, drink, and celebration,” she is now “completely and thankfully healthy.”

She estimates that she has consumed over 48,000 pills over the past 14 years – mostly protease-inhibitors, which have kept the virus at bay. Today, her regime is down to three pills a day.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

She has never had a negative reaction to the drugs or suffered ill effects from HIV. She sums up her good health by saying, quite calmly, “You can have a normal life with HIV.”

Her ex-boyfriend died five years ago from complications of AIDS. Hofmann says he didn’t know he had the virus or that he was passing it along to her. She says he was not “a gift-giver” – a person who knowingly and intentionally passes along HIV.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Hofmann tells her story in an exceptionally well-written book, I Have Something to Tell You. It reads like a novel and is selling well. (”Even my plumber has read it,” she confides.)

She says that writing the book – and more importantly, telling the truth about life with HIV – was “a new beginning.” It led her to become an activist and gave her life a mission: “to tell everyone in the world willing to listen how to prevent getting HIV, how to get tested, how to get proper treatment in order to live, and how to change the insulting stigma so often associated with the disease.”home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Hofmann fulfills her mission in several ways: She is editor-in-chief of POZ, a national magazine for people living with HIV and AIDS. And she recently joined the board of directors of AmfAR, The Foundation for AIDS research, by far the most important organization of its kind in the U.S.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Despite years of hard work, Hofmann worries she’s not doing enough. She’s deeply concerned about the current state of the pandemic.

“The world and America are suffering from ‘AIDS apathy,’ ” she says.

The numbers she reels off are proof that there is no reason for complacency: Every nine seconds, someone in the world is diagnosed with HIV; 33.4 million people are estimated to be living with the virus, and 25 million have died from AIDS to date. The numbers, she says, “make the HIV/AIDS pandemic far and away the worst medical catastrophe to have visited humankind since the Black Death struck Europe in the 14th century.”home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Hofmann is concerned about the disease’s effect on women, particularly African-American women. AIDS is the number-one killer of women between the ages of 15 and 44 worldwide; in the U.S., 27 percent of people infected with HIV are female and disproportionately African-American (although the good news is that African-American men are more likely to get tested than other racial and ethnic groups).home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“Women are not in a position of power when it comes to sex,” says Hofmann, when asked about the discrepancy in numbers. She talks of women she has seen in her travels who are caught up in the sex trade.

“They have sex to make money to buy food to feed their children. They make more money if they have sex without a condom – almost five times more than if they have sex with a man who uses one,” she says.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

She sees the development and use of microbicides as one of the most promising preventive interventions to emerge over the past decade. She says they are an effective weapon against HIV/AIDS for young girls forced into early marriage in sub-Sahara Africa and other parts of the developing world. These young women are often infected by their older husbands, who have had unprotected sex with HIV-positive prostitutes.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Hofmann’s activist work has taken her as far away as Vietnam and as near as Greenwich, CT. She remembers a visit to a Greenwich middle school, when a supervisor warned her not to answer any questions about sex, and a 12-year-old male student asked her if it was safe to keep a condom in his wallet. Hoffman plowed ahead and answered him: “Just make sure that you check the expiration date on the condom and don’t use it if it has expired.” The student shot back: “Oh, I’ll get to it long before it expires.”home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Hofmann is frustrated with Americans’ views about sexuality education. She quotes her mother: “Condoms are like Band-Aids and gardening gloves: they’re just a protective device.” She wishes that every parent and teacher would use this wise analogy.

She has wonderful ideas for HIV/AIDS prevention. She’d like to see HIV-prevention ads run during halftime of the 2011 Super Bowl.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“Why can’t we discuss how football and the leadership idolatry it creates be leveraged to help educate American youth about sexual health?” she asks. “Give us one cool player from each team mentioning the use of ‘safe sex,’ and maybe a cheerleader or two, and that should get the nation’s attention!”

She favors teaching young people decision-making skills in sex ed, so that in the heat of the moment, they will have the skills they need to discuss using condoms or not having sex.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

“Courses have to be much more explicit than most presently are, and young people need to practice putting condoms over rubber penises in the classroom. They also need to learn to put them on in the dark,” says Hofmann.

“Sex isn’t just kissing or intercourse; it’s everything in between,” she adds.

For Regan Hofmann – whose story has given her a global vision and global work – preventing HIV is about self-esteem, human rights, and personal dignity. She will spend her life doing everything in her power to removing its stigma and stop the virus from infecting more women and men.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

That is what Hofmann has to tell us.

Will we listen?

On World AIDS day of last year Zuma stated, “We have no choice but to deploy every effort, mobilise every resource, and utilise every skill that our nation possesses, to ensure that we prevail in this struggle for the health and prosperity of our nation The amount of resources dedicated to prevention, treatment and care [for HIV and TB] has increased…but it is not enough. Much more needs to be done. We need extraordinary measures to reverse the trends we are seeing in the health profile of our people.”home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Despite the poverty of the area, the Khayelitsha programme is a place where extraordinary measures have been implemented for more than a decade. It is an important model for demonstrating the feasibility of different strategies to achieve the targets set forth in the National Strategic Plan (NSP) for HIV/AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs), including achieving “universal coverage” of antiretrovirals, by 2011- all of which would have been impossible without the relentless combined efforts of Khayelitsha residents, the Treatment Action Campaign, Médecins Sans Frontières, the Provincial Government of the Western Cape, the City of Cape Town, the Universities of Cape Town and Stellenbosch, and many others.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Khayelitsha was the first in South Africa to provide ARVs in public sector clinics and its initial success contributed to the paradigm shift from the consensus that providing ARVs was not feasible in poor settings, to making it a priority. It is also one of two pilot projects in the country to provide treatment for drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB) in clinics while patients live at home, rather than requiring hospitalisation away from family and friends for at least six months.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit

Doctors working in Khayelitsha hailed the first of December 2009 as the first “happy” World AIDS Day this country had ever seen. Indeed President Zuma’s speech and the newly approved HIV treatment guidelines include evidence-based HIV and TB policy shifts that many had been fighting for for years, such as providing ARVs to all HIV-infected infants and to pregnant women and people with TB with a CD4 count of less than 350. The President also committed to treating TB and HIV “under one roof” and ensuring that all the health institutions in the country are ready to assist patients and not just a few accredited ARV centres.home hiv test, hiv self test, home hiv kit