October 21st, 2020The HPTN084 study being conducted in six African countries holds out the promise of a bi-monthly injection for women as an empower new way to prevent HIV infection, writes Siyabonga Kamnqa for Spotlight.
Kamnqa writes that arguably the most...
September 23rd, 2020The World Health Organisation (WHO) has agreed rules for the testing of African herbal remedies to fight COVID-19, reports BBC News. Sound science would be the sole basis for safe and effective traditional therapies to be adopted, it said. Any...
Preliminary results from a large study COVID-19 patients in South Africa indicate that HIV and TB have a modest effect on mortality, lead scientists Professor Quarraisha Abdool Karim and Professor Salim Abdool Karim, write in Science.
"Patients...
July 29th, 2020Drawing on verbal autopsies, a study conducted in Mpumalanga examined what prevented people from seeking, reaching and receiving quality care in a rural part of South Africa.
Justine Davis, professor of global health, Institute for Applied...
July 22nd, 2020The COVID-19 pandemic is seen as the cause of patients defaulting on chronic medical and not seeking care. New data points to fears of contracting COVID-19 at congested health facilities as the primary reason for people not seeking needed care and...
July 15th, 2020The need to strengthen surgical care systems is especially urgent in sub-Saharan Africa, where access is strikingly limited, leading to the highest mortality and morbidity from surgically preventable and treatable conditions in the world, write...
June 3rd, 2020The University of KwaZulu-Natal's analysis of the COVID-19 outbreak at St Augustine's hospital in Durban, which infected 119 and killed 15, is the most extensive study of any hospital outbreak of COVID-19 so far, writes Science.
It suggests...
May 27th, 2020
Rates of tuberculosis (TB) recurrence increased by almost nine-fold between episode 2 and 5 regardless of HIV status, according to a study assessing recurrent tuberculosis in Cape Town, South Africa, over a 13-year period.
“TB disease among...
April 22nd, 2020
Darunavir/ritonavir administered with rifampicin causes hepatotoxicities in people living with HIV, according to results of a study led by researchers at the department of medicine, the Wellcome Centre for Infectious Diseases Research in Africa...
November 20th, 2019
Until malaria is eradicated, drugs are critical to its management. New challenges to the effectiveness of treatments – including drug resistance – have emerged and must be overcome by discovering new agents, write Professor Kelly Chibale of...
October 29th, 2019
A review of HIV incidence among young people in east and southern Africa since antiretroviral treatment (ART) roll-out reveals failures to reach the highest-risk young women. The systematic review and meta-analysis also found ART roll-out did not...
October 9th, 2019
Results of a study of more than 700,000 one to 19-year olds being treated for HIV infection suggests a ten-fold increase in the number of adolescents aged 15 to 19 receiving HIV treatment in South Africa. However, Medical Xpress reports, despite...
October 2nd, 2019
Sugar-sweetened beverage producers submitted evidence that was out of context and exaggerated, in their appeal against South Africa’s proposed new sugar levy, Health-e News reports research has found. Coca-Cola, the Beverage Association of South...
October 2nd, 2019
Programmes to scale-up HIV testing and treatment in countries in sub-Saharan Africa may have had less impact on new HIV infections than hoped, partly because they haven’t paid enough attention to groups that contribute disproportionately to HIV...
September 25th, 2019
More than that 80% registrars at the University of the Witwatersrand's School of Clinical Medicine suffer from burnout, a response to prolonged stress, with “extremely high” levels of depersonalisation, affecting professional response to...
A study focusing on language acquisition in Khayelitsha near Cape Town has found that adolescents with low language ability have higher levels of depressive symptoms. The study was published in the journal PLOS One.
The results highlight a...
