HIV and AIDS today: where is social work going?
In 2006 a bittersweet historical landmark was reached--25 years of the HIV and AIDS pandemic. Many in the field took this opportunity to reflect on the advances, progress, and stalemates (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2006; Gallo, 2006; Traynor, 2006). In this column I also reflect on...

Financial burden of health services for people with HIV/AIDS in India.
In resource-limited settings, illness can impose a major financial burden on patients and their families. With the advent and increasing accessibility of antiretroviral therapy, HIV/AIDS has now become a fundamentally chronic treatable disease with far reaching economic and social consequences, and hence it is crucial to also examine the...

Logistics pose an obstacle for flu antiviral Rx.
MONTREAL -- Although influenza vaccination continues to be underutilized, it is a success story compared with the use of influenza antiviral medications, experts agreed at an international conference on community-acquired pneumonia. Medications such as zanamivir and oseltamivir can prevent or greatly reduce the major symptoms and sequelae...

Malaria remains a major health threat to travelers.
Malaria, which infects over 500 million people worldwide, has caused over one million deaths and threatened the lives of about 40 percent of the world's population. It is also one of the leading causes of death among expatriates and business travelers as tens of thousands of them...

Introduction: HIV and AIDS in rural Papua New Guinea.
In late 2004, we were in the peri-urban centre of Balimo in the Western Province of Papua New Guinea where we have been conducting fieldwork for eleven years: Charles initiated a male-only survey on condom use and Alison was interviewing groups of women in the Balimo area about their...

Megadeath in Mexico: epidemics followed the Spanish arrival in the New World, but the worst killer may have been a shadowy native--a killer that could still be out there.
WHEN HERNANDO CORTES AND HIS SPANISH ARMY OF fewer than a thousand men stormed into Mexico in 1519, the native population numbered about 22 million. By the end of the century, following a series of devastating epidemics, only 2 million people remained. Even compared with the casualties of the...

Rabies catches health officials.
SURAT: Diseases like leptospirosis, dengue and cholera--besides water-borne epidemics--make headlines during monsoon each year. However, what has caught local health officials on the wrong foot is their failure to treat cases of rabies. Instances of Bhula,who could not be treated for dog bite in any hospital, and...

Company Watch July 2005.
France proposes airline tax to prevent spread of disease. French President Jacques Chirac is urging world leaders to support his plan for an international tax on airline tickets that would pay to prevent widespread epidemics. The plan could raise $3 billion each year, according to French officials. Algeria, Brazil,...

Global AIDS Epidemic Continues To Grow.
New Data Also Show HIV Prevention Programmes Getting Better Results If Focused On Reaching People Most At Risk And Adapted To Changing National Epidemics GENEVA, Nov. 21 /Xinhua-PRNewswire/ -- The global AIDS epidemic continues to grow and there is concerning evidence that some countries are...

A vaccine for your in-box.
Computer scientist Eran Shir of Tel Aviv University in Israel sees a lot of electronic epidemics that should not have happened: viruses that spread rapidly because computers have no way of knowing not to run malicious programs. His solution is to give computers the digital equivalent of the human...