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Anti-AIDS
efforts must BANGKOK, Nov 4: Thailand’s AIDS control programme is a model for developing nations, but the country should reverse sharp cuts in spending to fight the pandemic and shed legal inhibitions in tackling it, according to the World Bank.......more New breast cancer tests WASHINGTON, Nov 4: New tests are being developed that should eventually help doctors tailor treatment for breast cancer patients, but they are still too experimental to use on most patients, according to experts.....more Two heart radiation WASHINGTON, Nov 4: Two novel devices that use radiation delivered inside the heart to help keep surgically opened arteries from clogging again has ...more Crew of space station CAPE CANABERAL, FLA, Nov 4: The crew of the international space station have a toilet, a food warmer and video-conferencing technology, but ....more |
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Arafat invited to meet GAZA CITY, Nov 4: US President Bill Clinton has invited Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to meet .....more Negotiations to end KATHMANDU, Nov 4: Negotiations to end a communist insurgency in the Hindu Himalayan King....more
Clashes continue in GAZA CITY, Nov 4: Fresh clashes broke out in the Gaza strip early today following overnight.....more |
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Anti-AIDS efforts must now move to drug users BANGKOK, Nov 4: Thailand’s AIDS control programme is a model for developing nations, but the country should reverse sharp cuts in spending to fight the pandemic and shed legal inhibitions in tackling it, according to the World Bank. In the past seven years, a highly successful programme centred on the commercial sex industry and carried out by Government agencies, Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and community groups, is estimated to have prevented 200,000 HIV cases in the South-East Asian nation. Thanks to a dramatic increase in condom use in the sex industry from 14 to 90 percent, the number of new HIV cases reported annually has plunged by more than 80 percent in the last decade, says a new report released by the World Bank’s Thailand office. "This is an accomplishment that few other countries, if any, have been able to replicate. Thailand’s response is widely cited as one of the few examples of an effective national aids prevention programme anywhere in the world," said the study released last evening. The number of new HIV infections in Thailand dropped from about 137,000 per year in 1990 to 29,000 per year in 2000, says the study entitled ‘Thailand’s response to AIDS - building on success, confronting the future’. "However, efforts to check the spread of HIV will have to move beyond sex industry because the nature of the epidemic is changing in Thailand," added the study. J. Shivakumar, head of the World Bank in Thailand who presented the report, urged the Thai Government to step up spending on preventing HIV/AIDS in the country. Thailand’s AIDS control budget has been slashed by 28 percent in the last three years. Last year, the Government earmarked 1.4 billion baht (37.9 million US dollars) on programmes against the spread of HIV and treating AIDS patients. However, less than one-tenth of this was for programmes aimed at preventing HIV among adults. The cut in budgetary spending was due to the economic crisis which began in 1997, but the World Bank expressed concern that the maximum cut was in preventive expenditure. AIDS has so far claimed 300,000 lives in the country and there are 700,000 people living with HIV/AIDS. HIV is now being mainly spread by unprotected sex between spouses, young boys and girls, and injecting drug use. But these groups are being neglected by the official anti-AIDS programme, says the study. "This country has been a leader in the fight against HIV/AIDS. However, AIDS in Thailand is evolving, moving from one population group to another. The country’s response — and in particular the government’s response — needs to be flexible to respond quickly to the changes in the epidemic," Shivakumar told reporters. According to two of the study’s authors — World Bank expert Martha Ainsworth and Chris Beyrer of John Hopkins University in the United States — Thailand will have to overcome "policy barriers" in tackling the spread of HIV among the new high-risk group of injecting drug users. The report cites estimates that show that half of the 29,000 people expected to test positive for HIV in 2000 will get the virus from spouses, or be boys and girls who engage in unsafe sex. One out of every four persons expected to test positive for HIV this year will be an injecting drug user, while only one out of five will be a commercial sex worker or client. One in seven new infections will be among children. "Some of the riskiest behaviours in Thailand have not been addressed and now stand out as major causes of continued HIV transmission," said the report. While advising the Government to keep up the "enormous achievements" in promoting condom use in commercial sex, the report urges that this be spread to all sexual relationships. Any let-up in condom use in commercial sex would lead to a resurgence of the spread of HIV, but it is also vital to encourage safe sex among other groups, it says. This is specially needed in sexual relations among unmarried young people in the country, where condom use is a mere 12 percent. "They (young people) need broader messages concerning condom use, and better access to condoms at affordable prices," said Ainsworth. However, tackling HIV spread among injecting drug users is "not going to be easy" for Thailand, says Beyrer. HIV is spread by the practice of sharing of needles and syringes among injecting drug users with HIV and others, and it is major method of transmission in neighbouring countries like Malaysia. However, the Thai Government is said to be reluctant to distribute needles and syringes — a controversial step in many countries — because it sees this as encouraging illegal drug abuse. Thailand will have to help injecting drug users just like it promoted condom usage in illegal brothels, say the World Bank experts. "However, the pragmatic approach followed in preventing HIV transmission in commercial sex, which is also illegal, has not been followed for IDU (injecting drug users), who remain highly stigmatised, and frequently incarcerated," said the report. The report states that nearly half of all injecting drug users in the southern parts of thailand have HIV. "IDU will continue to be a reservoir of infection and will pass HIV not only to other IDU, but their sexual partners and children," it added. (IPS) |
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New breast cancer tests too new, experts decide WASHINGTON, Nov 4: New tests are being developed that should eventually help doctors tailor treatment for breast cancer patients, but they are still too experimental to use on most patients, according to experts. They said the tests, including genetic tests meant to show whether a tumour will be affected by a certain drug, need to be assessed further in clinical trials to make sure they will actually make a difference to women. The experts, including top Oncologists and researchers from around the country, spent three days debating the best breast cancer treatments at a national institutes of health "consensus conference". "It is not to say they these (new tests) shouldn’t be studied," Dr. Patricia Eifel, a Professor at the M.D. Anderson Cancer Centre at the University of Texas and chair of the panel, told a news conference yesterday. "A lot of these are not sufficiently validated to use in determining therapy at this point." "They have a lot of potential," added Dr. Jose Costa of the Yale University School of Medicine. The trouble is, only a very small percentage of cancer patients take part in clinical trials, so it is hard to quickly get useful information about potential new treatments. This year more than 180,000 U.S. women will be diagnosed with breast cancer and 41,000 will die of it, according to the American Cancer Society. A woman has about a one in 10 chance of developing breast cancer. Experts say most breast cancer cases are now caught early, and the standard treatment is to cut out either the tumour or the whole affected area. Radiation and Chemotherapy add to the success of the operation, the idea being to catch any tiny little tumours too small to detect. But there is no real consensus on which chemotherapy drugs are the best to use, who should get them and when. The experts said their statement would begin to address this issue. Gene chips and similar devices that measure proteins produced by cells may play a role one day in determining the best drug therapy, but not yet. One main piece of advice is to test tissue samples from all patients to see if the tumour cells respond to female hormones. If they do, or if the test is uncertain, all patients should be offered hormone therapy, which includes the drug tamoxifen, using surgery or radiation to destroy the ovaries, or other drugs such as aromatase inhibitor drugs including anastrozole, made by Astrazeneca under the name arimidex or lutenizing hormone releasing hormone (lhrh) agonist drugs such as goserelin (astrazeneca’s zoladex). The experts strongly endorsed the use of tamoxifen, the only drug shown to prevent breast cancer in women at high risk. They said it should be given to women for at least 5 years. "Although tamoxifen has been associated with a slight but definite increase in the risk of endometrial (uterine) cancer and venous thromboembolism (blood clots), the benefit of tamoxifen treatment far outweighs its risks in the majority of women," they wrote. They said there was not enough evidence to justify the use of osteoporosis drugs such as raloxifene, sold by Eli Lilly and Co under the name evista, which are being tested to see if they might work to prevent breast cancer in the way that tamoxifen does. One practicing Oncologist who served on the panel said she could take the information straight to her patients. "I can go back to my practice on Monday and help them know where we are at," Dr. Carolyn Hendricks of Bethesda, Maryland, said in an interview. Hendricks said, for instance, that it was exciting to know that temporarily shutting off a woman’s ovaries — called ovarian ablation — could be an effective way to fight breast cancer. "If you have a very young woman and she wants to preserve her future childbearing ... There is no evidence that it is not equal to chemotherapy," she said.(REUTERS) |
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Two heart radiation devices approved by US WASHINGTON, Nov 4: Two novel devices that use radiation delivered inside the heart to help keep surgically opened arteries from clogging again has won US approval, the makers said. The products are designed to treat a complication of angioplasty that occurs in about 100,000 Americans each year. Healthcare products giant Johnson Johnson said yesterday the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cleared its checkmate system, and Georgia-based medical device maker Novoste Corp said it won approval for its product, the beta-cath system. Both work similarly but use different types of radiation. Each year, US doctors perform hundreds of thousands of angioplasty procedures, in which a balloon-tipped catheter is deployed to clear blocked arteries. In many cases, physicians follow angioplasty by placing a stent, a tiny tube to prop an artery open. In about one-quarter of those patients, tissue growth around the stent creates a new blockage. That condition is called in-stent restenosis. "Until now, no development has been able to overcome the obstacle of recurrent blockages," said Dr Paul Teirstein, an investigator on tests of the checkmate device. With the new devices, physicians use a catheter that delivers radioactive seeds to the blockage. Novoste’s device uses what is known as beta radiation, a localised type of energy that allows medical personnel to stay in the room with the patient. The treatment takes about 10 minutes. A clinical trial of 476 patients showed that incidence of restenosis was 36 percent to 66 percent lower in patients treated with treated with beta radiation rather than a placebo, novoste said in a press release. Johnson Johnson’s device, made by unit Cordis Corp., employs gamma radiation, a type that requires doctors to leave the room to avoid exposure. It also takes somewhat longer to deliver the radiation, but the company says the total procedure time is similar to the beta-cath. Cordis also noted that the checkmate can reach long lesions and small blood vessels that are common among diabetics. Industry analysts estimate the market for the products could range from 500 million dollars to 1.5 billion dollars a year. But they note the market could be eclipsed in a few years by drug-coated stents now in development. (REUTERS) |
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Crew of space station overwhelmed by unpacking CAPE CANABERAL, FLA, Nov 4: The crew of the international space station have a toilet, a food warmer and video-conferencing technology, but they’re running short on oxygen and have sometimes seemed overwhelmed by all the unpacking they must do. The crew of two Russians and their American commander arrived on Thursday and have been breathing the air already aboard the 13-story structure. That, plus some supplemental supplies, should be enough to last them until they have installed a Russian-made system that separates the oxygen and hydrogen molecules in water stored aboard the station NASA said yesterday. The water is a by-product of power generators on US space shuttles. Shuttle crews have been leaving the water behind during visits over the past two years. The real problem facing astronauts Bill Shepherd, Sergei Krikolyov and Yuri Gidzenko is tons of stowed supplies and hardware that clog the narrow corridors of the station. Thursday they had to eat their first meal without forks, spoons or knives that they couldn’t locate. A food warmer that was supposed to take 30 minutes to install consumed hours of their time when they could not find a cable. The problem, said Jeff Hanley, lead flight director for the NASA portion of the mission, is "a few things have fallen through the cracks." Not literally, of course, nothing falls in the weightlessness of space, but the written procedures the crew carried with them into orbit have not been entirely reliable. That led shepherd to advise his bosses at NASA mission control, "we worked really hard yesterday and we could not keep up with the timeline. We’re way behind today, too." As Hanley explained, the situation in space is far from chaotic, but when the crew cannot find something they have no alternative but to call on Russian ground controllers, who are calling the shots during this early phase of the mission. Russian ground stations are only available when the space station is passing over one of them, which means the crew can communicate with the ground only about 10-15 minutes at mostout of each 90-minute orbit. When the US takes over day-to-day control of the station next year, crews will be in communication with the ground for all but a few minutes of each orbit, due to a nasa satellite system designed for use by the space shuttle programme. The 60 billion US dollars space-station project is a joint effort by the United States, Russia, Europe, Japan and Canada. When finished in 2006, it should be one of the brightest objects in the nighttime sky. The US space shuttle endeavour is on its launch pad at Florida’s Kennedy Space Centre for a launch later this month that will begin a new phase of construction on the US segment of the station. The US laboratory module, destiny, is to be added in January. The current space station crew, known as expedition one, will serve until February, when they will be replaced by a crew of two Americans and a Russian commander. Crew command is scheduled to pass between the two nations throughout the construction phase of the station’s life. (REUTERS) |
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Arafat invited to meet Clinton in Washington GAZA CITY, Nov 4: US President Bill Clinton has invited Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to meet with him in Washington on Thursday, but the date has not yet been confirmed because it conflicts with another Arafat engagement, a Palestinian official spokesman said. Marwan Kanafani, Arafat’s spokesman, said that Arafat had plans to travel to Doha, Qatar, on Thursday for an administrative meeting linked to the Islamic summit starting there the following Sunday. On Friday, Arafat was expected to attend a meeting of Islamic Foreign Ministers in Doha and then stay on for the Islamic summit itself. Kanafani said Arafat had agreed to meet Clinton separately from any meeting between Clinton and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. The White House announced yesterday that Clinton hopes to meet with Arafat and Barak in Washington next week. Kanafani said Arafat proposed discussing many issues with Clinton, including Israeli aggression towards the Palestinian people ... And how the United States can seriously become involved in the peace process. The United States is concerned about security in the entire region, not only about the Israeli and Palestinians, he said, indicating that this subject would also be up for discussion at the meeting. In Jerusalem, an Israeli official told AFP that Barak will meet with Clinton in the United States at the end of next week if there is no sudden upsurge of violence. (AFP) |
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Negotiations to end communist
insurgency KATHMANDU, Nov 4: Negotiations to end a communist insurgency in the Hindu Himalayan Kingdom that has claimed almost 1,500 lives in less than five years today collapsed as Maoist rebels declared they would no longer talk with the ruling Nepali Congress Government of Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala. The rebels, in a statement, criticised the Government for "staging a drama" while releasing a top Maoist field commander and another activist yesterday without caring to inform either them or the negotiator who was facilitating the Government-rebel talks. Human rights activist and left leader Padma Ratan Tuladhar who had last week brokered the first "informal peace talks" between the Government and the Maoists also came down heavily on the Koirala administration. "The Maoists will now have nothing to do with this Government. They will talk with anybody else. The maoists also want parties other then the ruling Nepali Congress to prepare an atmosphere for the resolution of the insurgency." Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister Ram Chandra Paudel had last week met Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) central committee member Rabindra Shreshtha at an undisclosed location in the Kathmandu Valley for "unofficial talks" brokered by Tuladhar. The meeting was expected to pave the way for future "official talks" aimed at finally ending the nearly five-year-old insurgency. Tuladhar stressed the need for reaching "an understanding" at the earliest or else "the gains of the past few days will be lost." The Government had yesterday released two Maoist activists from police custody at an elaborately staged press conference where the two rebels declared they were abjuring maoist violence witnessed in the country over the past five years and were quitting the CPN(Maoist). Within hours of their release, however, the two - CPN(Maoist) central committee member and field commander Dinesh Sharma and activist Dinanath Gautam - repudiated the very statement they had made before the media as one delivered "under duress and after months of harsh police torture." Observers here feel that the "press conference" was a face-saving move by the Government as it could not be seen buckling to the Maoist demands. The maoists had set a deadline forthe Government till 1500 hrs yesterday to make public the whereabouts of Dinesh Sharma and other Maoist activists and commence the procedure for their release. (UNI) |
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Clashes continue in Palestinian territories GAZA CITY, Nov 4: Fresh clashes broke out in the Gaza strip early today following overnight gunbattles, but the Israeli Army reported a noticeable decrease in violence, giving hope that a truce between Palestinians and Israelis is beginning to take effect. Seven Palestinians were injured in clashes with Israeli soldiers on the border between the Gaza strip and Israel near the Bureij Refugee Camp early this morning. But calm returned to the volatile Karni crossing into Israel, scene of clashes yesterday and the focus of much of the violence that has engulfed the Gaza strip and West Bank in the past five weeks, witnesses said. The Israeli Army overnight withdrew its tanks from Karni crossing after redeploying them today amid violent clashs with Palestinians which left at least 12 people wounded. Tanks were also withdrawn from outside the Kfar Darom Jewish settlement in the heart of the Gaza strip, witnesses said. The drop in violence follows a fragile cease-fire agreed by Palestinia leader Yasser Arafat and former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres early Thursday morning. Under the terms of the deal, Israel is to pull out its military equipment from flashpoints and from the entrances of Palestinian-run cities, while Palestinian police are required to prevent youths from throwing stones and firebombs at Israeli soldiers. In a new push for peace, the White House announced today that US President Bill Clinton hopes to meet with Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak in Washington next week. Senior Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said in Washington that Arafat had agreed to a meeting, which would be held separately from any meeting between Clinton and Barak. Meanwhile, near Morag Jewish settlement, witnesses said a Palestinian walking home was shot and wounded by Israeli soldiers. Hospital sources described his condition as serious. Exchanges of gunfire also occurred overnight in atleast three West Bank towns, including an incident in which Israeli tanks fired shells into Beit Sahour near Bethlehem. An Israeli spokesman told AFP the shelling was in response to fire on israeli positions by Palestinian heavy machine-guns, a rare accusation against the generally lightly armed Palestinians. Israel yesterday gave the Palestinians 24 hours to bring calm to the region, but admitted that arafat had no magic wand to stop the violence. We have noted that orders and instructions (from Arafat) have been given, but the results do not satisfy us at all, Danny Yatom, Principal Adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, told Israeli Army radio. Referring to the deadline, Yatom said: I suggest we should not be constantly looking at our watches and counting every minute. We must look at what happens on the ground, to see if there are actions as well as words, a real willingness and capacity of the Palestinian authority to achieve calm. (AFP) |
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