FOCUS: PUBLIC HEALTH
Anti-foreigner group ups ante at healthcare facilities
Despite warnings against vigilantism, the controversial March on March movement is extending its campaign to several other hospitals and clinics in KwaZulu-Natal, and elsewhere, in its campaign to prevent healthcare access to foreign nationals.
Although, for the past six weeks, members of the movement have been guarding various public hospital and clinic entrances and aggressively denying entry to anyone who is not South African or who is suspected of being an undocumented migrant, there appears to be little action from...
Africa braces for spike in mosquito-borne diseases after US cuts
The withdrawal of US funding could see a worsening of mosquito-borne diseases and a reversal in the progress made in beating the spread, with Zimbabwe now being pummelled by a surge in malaria cases, and the WHO warning that chikungunya is spreading rapidly from several Indian Ocean islands into Africa.
However, scientists and leaders in the field are also optimistic about interventions to help reduce the infection rates, with encouraging results from a study using Ivermectin as a treatment along...