Joyce Mulama
NAIROBI, Nov 30 2006 (IPS) – Which citizens is a government most accountable to? Those who voted it into power? Or is it more the people who re too young to cast ballots too short, even, to reach the table in a voting booth: the children?
If it s the latter, then how has Kenya s government conducted itself towards the nation s children in the matter of HIV/AIDS? Those who pause to take stock of this, Friday, in commemoration of World AIDS Day (for which the theme this year is Accountability ) will find themselves confronted with a situation which often seems to contain more problems than solutions.
The country and the world at large have shown commitment to fighting the disease, but children have received a raw deal, said Michael Angaga, national co-ordi…
Pratap Chatterjee*
WASHINGTON, Jan 18 2007 (IPS) – The convoy of flatbed trucks picked up its cargo at Baghdad International Airport last spring and sped northwest, stacked high with crates of expensive medical equipment. From bilirubin metres and hematology analysers to infant incubators and dental appliances, the equipment had been ordered to help Iraq shore up a disintegrating health care system.
But instead of being delivered to 150 brand-new Primary Health Care centres (PHCs) as originally planned, the Eagle Global Logistics vehicles were directed to drop them off at a storage warehouse in Abu Ghraib.
Not only did some of the equipment arrive damaged at the warehouse, owned by PWC of Kuwait, one in 14 crates was missing, according to the delivery documents. The s…
Marwaan Macan-Markar
BANGKOK, Aug 21 2009 (IPS) – A behind-the-scenes tussle between the pro-business, free trade wing of the Thai government and the country s public health activists is raging over the fate of a national programme to supply cheaper generic drugs.
Activists are worried that Bangkok s plans to strengthen the country s intellectual property (IP) strategy could come at a heavy price for the tens of thousands of Thais who depend on the locally produced generic versions of expensive brand-name drugs to stay alive.
Signs that this clash could spill over into the public arena emerged this month following a strongly worded letter written to Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, which accused the government of ignoring the plight of Thais who depend on generic med…
Isaiah Esipisu
NAIROBI, Jun 22 2011 (IPS) – People in Western Kenya are now able to buy effective anti-malarial drugs at low prices thanks to the success of the Global Fund s subsidy programme, and thanks to honest pharmacists who are reselling the drugs at the recommended low prices.
The drugs subsidised through the Affordable Medicines Facility – malaria. Credit: Isaiah Esipisu/IPS
The program by the Global Fund to subsidise the cost of the most effective anti-malaria…
Young boy sitting on a wall outside ‘Way Home’, a UNICEF-assisted shelter providing food, accommodation, literacy trainings and HIV/AIDS-awareness lessons to street children in Odessa, Ukraine. Because of unsafe sex and injecting drug use, street adolescents are one of the groups most at risk of contracting HIV. Credit: UNICEF/G. Pirozzi
KIEV, Dec 9 2014 (IPS) – Marginalised communities and civil society groups helping them are warning of a “tragedy” in Eastern Europe and Central Asia (EECA) as international funding for HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis (TB) programmes in the regions is cut back.
The EECA is home to the world’s only growing HIV/AIDS epidemic and is the s…