Marwaan Macan-Markar
TRAT, Thailand, Feb 23 2010 (IPS) – When the conversation here shifts to domestic violence, even the way a woman got pregnant becomes an issue of concern, particularly if the price for bearing a child means getting infected with HIV.
That is what happened to 34-year-old Nowares Khlangkamnerd, who only discovered she had got HIV from her husband when she was summoned by a local hospital shortly before giving birth to her first child.
I got very angry because he didn t tell me about his status, reveals Nowares during a conversation here with other women who had suffered a similar plight. The way I got infected was a form of domestic violence, because if he had revealed his HIV status we could have had safe sex with a condom and I would not have cau…
Paul Virgo
ROME, Apr 1 2010 (IPS) – Non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are guilty of judging a palm oil project in Uganda on innuendo rather than its merits, the United Nations poverty agency supporting the controversial scheme said, as the project starts to bear fruit for smallholder farmers.
Local civil society groups, however, are standing by a report they commissioned last year accusing a private-public partnership on Uganda s Bugala Island on Lake Victoria of a series of environmental and social misdemeanours.
The palm oil industry has long been under fire for, among other things, its contribution to deforestation and the destruction of endangered animals habitats in Asia.
The U.N. International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) says this is beh…
Stephen Leahy
UXBRIDGE, Canada, Apr 29 2010 (IPS) – The war on drugs is a complete failure everywhere, according a comprehensive review of 20 years of scientific literature released at the Harm Reduction 2010 conference in Liverpool, England that wraps up Thursday.
The war on drugs does not work, period, said Dr. Julio Montaner, president of the International AIDS Society.
We must take an evidence-based approach to dealing with the drug market, because current strategies are not working and people are paying for ill-considered policies with their lives, Montaner said in a release.
An examination of all English-language scientific literature dating back more than 20 years reveals that drug law enforcement dramatically escalates drug-market violence. Contrary …
William Fisher
NEW YORK, Jun 10 2010 (IPS) – Human rights groups are turning to an obscure government agency to investigate allegations that medical professionals on the payroll of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) helped the agency to perform experiments on detainees in U.S. custody following the terrorist attacks of Sep. 11, 2001, in an effort to make enhanced interrogation techniques more efficient and provide them with legal cover.
The organisations called a telephone press conference Wednesday to announce that since the Barack Obama administration has not responded to previous requests, they are asking the Office for Human Research Protections (OHRP), part of the Department of Health and Human Services, to launch an official investigation.
Their complaint con…
Claire Ngozo
LILONGWE, Jul 10 2010 (IPS) – As government implements a new HIV/AIDS treatment regimen according to latest world standards, a major grouping of non-governmental organisations are concerned that the high cost of the new medication will mean government will no longer be able provide free treatment to as many people as before.
Government is failing to provide free HIV treatment for many poor people and chi…
Emilio Godoy
MEXICO CITY, Aug 3 2010 (IPS) – It s summertime, so the Año de Juárez public primary school in Barrios de San Lucas, a working-class neighbourhood on the east side of the Mexican capital, is deserted.
Thanks to summer vacation, which ends in late August, the students have a break from the penetrating stench from the American Roll factory that produces asbestos brake linings for cars. The odour from the nearby plant made this reporter s throat burn.
You smell the stench at every hour of the day, it s horrible, Teresa Martínez, a homemaker who lives near the plant, told IPS. In the morning, as I m hanging clothes up to dry outside, I can see the shadow cast by what comes out of the factory s smokestack, and a yellow film of dust is left on the ground. <…
Chris Stein
JOHANNESBURG, Aug 30 2010 (IPS) – Though it may look like a tea bag, straining water through this recently developed filter could provide a cheap, easily replenished source of water for those who need it most.
A young boy drinks water from an unclean water source. Credit: Fidelis Zvomuya
The unique device, developed at Stellenbosch University in South Africa, is no ordinary tea bag. It is a sophisticated yet inexpensive water filter that fits into the neck of a bottle and can quickly purify drinking w…
Megan Iacobini de Fazio
NEW YORK, Sep 22 2010 (IPS) – City life and access to information technologies can open up a whole new arena of possibilities for young girls: better education, access to healthcare, new skills and a plethora of new ideas.
Access to ICTs can enable women and girls to participate more fully in the life of their community and …
Ángel Páez
LIMA, Oct 15 2010 (IPS) – Poor, rural, Quechua-speaking women in the Peruvian province of Anta who were victims of a forced sterilisation programme between 1996 and 2000 have filed a new lawsuit in their continuing struggle for justice.
Members of Anta Women s Association heading to a meeting. Credit: Courtesy of Pierre Yves Gimet
In May 2009, Jaime Schwartz, the public prosecutor investigating the case against four former health ministers of the Alberto Fujimori adm…
Dingaan Mithi
LILONGWE, Nov 16 2010 (IPS) – There are 91,000 children living with HIV in Malawi. A shortage of resources means that many do not receive proper treatment and care.
The most recent AIDS Epidemic Update, published by UNAIDS and the World Health Organization, estimated that there were 2.1 million children under the age of 15 living with HIV worldwide in 2007; 1.8 million were found in Sub-Saharan Africa. The Campaign to End Pediatric AIDS (CEPA) estimates 370,000 African children were newly infected that year.
In Malawi, UNAIDS estimates that 91,000 children under 15 are living with HIV. Amongst the 27,000 of these children with advanced HIV and low CD4 counts, just under two-thirds are receiving anti-retroviral therapy.
Observers say this care is …