Ali al-Fadhily*
BAGHDAD, Jun 1 2007 (IPS) – Reports of the poor health among high-ranking Iraqi politicians are being seen as symbolic of the popular mood here about the U.S.-backed government.
In late February, Iraqi President Jalal Talabani was flown to neighbouring Jordan for medical treatment amid conflicting reports about his health. Sources in Amman and from Talabani s office in Baghdad told reporters that the 73-year-old had suffered a stroke, but in a televised interview his son said that Talabani was suffering from fatigue or exhaustion.
Meanwhile, Shi ite leader Abdul Azizi al-Hakim, leader of Iraq s largest Shia party, recently arrived in Iran for treatment for lung cancer after being diagnosed at a hospital in the southern U.S. state of Texas.
This…
Christi van der Westhuizen
GENEVA, Jun 30 2007 (IPS) – Only about 30 percent of Mozambicans think that their quality of life has improved since 2000, the year when the international community agreed on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), while about 42 percent believe life has not changed.
This emerged in a study conducted by the Mozambique Non-Governmental Organisations Survey Consortium, a group of Mozambican non-governmental organisations (NGOs) which decided to investigate public perceptions of development as defined by the MDGs.
The NGOs include the Mozambican Debt Group and G20, an alliance of 20 organisations involved in the fight against poverty. They were supported by the North-South Institute, a Canada-based development research body.
Researcher…
David Vargas
ASUNCIÓN, Aug 1 2007 (IPS) – A thousand inflated transparent plastic bags labelled Pathological Garbage cover the floor of one of the exhibition rooms at the Juan de Salazar Cultural Centre in the Paraguayan capital.
The bags form part of artist William Paats Asepsia (asepsis) exhibit, which is aimed at drawing attention to the serious problem of hospital waste disposal in this South American country.
The exhibit opened in early July, a year after the government s declaration of a health emergency when the two obsolete incinerators that disposed of the waste generated by the city s public hospitals were closed down.
That coincided with the Asunción city government s decision to cancel the contract with the Sudamericana company, which was in char…
Peter Ischyrion
PORT OF SPAIN, Aug 30 2007 (IPS) – Among the frequently asked questions on the website of the National AIDS Coordinating Committee (NACC) in Trinidad and Tobago is one dealing with the use of condoms in the fight against HIV/AIDS.
Can a condom protect me from getting HIV the AIDS virus? YES, used correctly and consistently, condoms are the only available barrier to reduce the risk of HIV transmission. Abstaining from sex is safest, but if one chooses to be sexually active, use a condom each and every time.
Now, having reported significant progress in addressing the rates of HIV/AIDS over the last five years, the Trinidad and Tobago government says it will purchase condom vending machines as one of several initiatives to deal with the virus.
F…
Alexandra Stahl
UNITED NATIONS, Oct 2 2007 (IPS) – A global coalition of governments and organisations has launched a new campaign to drastically improve pre- and post-natal healthcare in places like India, which alone accounts for a staggering 25 percent of the world #39s child deaths and 20 percent of maternal deaths.
Called Deliver Now a reference to the pledge made by 189 world leaders meeting at the United Nations seven years ago to reduce child deaths by two-thirds and maternal deaths by three-quarters by 2015, among other goals it brings together local government agencies, civil society, media and others to allocate existing health resources more effectively.
Halfway toward the deadline to achieve the so-called Millennium Development Goals, more than 10 million…
Interview with Thoraya Ahmed Obaid, UNFPA
LONDON, Oct 22 2007 (IPS) – The Women Deliver conference held in London last week has reminded a lot of people in the world of healthcare how much more they need to deliver to make pregnancy and childbirth safer for women.
Thoraya Obaid Credit:
More than 1,800 delegates from 109 countries, among them 70 ministers and parliamentarians, met in London Oct. 18-20 to work out new ways of improving maternal health. Thoraya Ahmed Obaid, executive director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) since January 2001, will inevitably be a leading figure in taking the new m…
Interview with Dr. Seth Berkley, International AIDS Vaccine Initiative
NEW YORK, Nov 27 2007 (IPS) – When one of the world #39s most promising large-scale HIV vaccine trials was shut down in September after it became clear that not only did the drug fail to block the virus, but may have even increased the vulnerability of some test volunteers to contracting HIV, it was a profoundly disappointing moment in the more than 20-year quest for a vaccine.
Dr. Seth Berkley Credit: IAVI
The International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI), headquartered in New York, is an important player in conducting and promoting va…
Arsène Séverin
BRAZZAVILLE, Jan 8 2008 (IPS) – At the Integrated Health Centre of Bissita, located in the Bacongo area of Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of Congo, pregnant women seated on a long bench wait to have prenatal examinations.
A member of this talkative group, Sylvie Bakani*, wears a concerned expression. Due to deliver in a few weeks, she is also HIV positive.
The doctor wanted her to take the test when she arrived for the first time at the centre, three months pregnant. When the test was positive, her husband threw her out, accusing her of being a prostitute. With time, she regained her courage, and (now) comes daily to be weighed, Eugénie Mbondji, Sylvie s mother, explained to IPS.
This situation encapsulates the problems facing thos…
Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Feb 12 2008 (IPS) – After nearly 30 years of intense campaigning against female genital mutilation (FGM), the United Nations says that several countries, including Canada, Belgium, Spain and Italy, have passed legislation criminalising the practice, prevalent mostly among immigrant communities.
There is a greater understanding of the practice as a violation of human rights, as well as its harmful health impacts, says a new U.N. report to be discussed at the upcoming two-week session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW), scheduled to take place Feb. 25 through Mar. 7.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has estimated between 100 and 140 million girls and women have undergone some form of FGM in more than 28 countries, mostly in Af…
Dahr Jamail and Ahmed Ali*
BAQUBA, Mar 10 2008 (IPS) – Iraq #39s children have been more gravely affected by the U.S. occupation than any other segment of the population.
The United Nations estimated that half a million Iraqi children died during more than 12 years of economic sanctions that preceded the U.S. invasion of March 2003, primarily as a result of malnutrition and disease.
But childhood malnutrition in Iraq has increased 9 percent since then, according to an Oxfam International report released last July.
A report from the non-governmental relief organisation Save the Children shows Iraq continues to have the highest mortality for children under five. Since the first Gulf War, this has increased 150 percent. It is estimated that one in eight children …