Obesity and HIV: Semaglutide should be rolled out in SA, says Dr Nomathemba Chandiwana

Obesity and HIV: Semaglutide should be rolled out in SA, says Dr Nomathemba Chandiwana

Obesity is a public health crisis in South Africa, similar to HIV in the late 1990s, Dr Nomathemba Chandiwana tells Spotlight on the sidelines of the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) in Denver, Colorado. She also presented research that found lifestyle behaviour changes had a limited effect on reversing weight gain in people living with HIV.

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New TB drug shows promise, but experimental vaccine disappoints

New TB drug shows promise, but experimental vaccine disappoints

While three new tuberculosis (TB) medicines have been registered in South Africa over the last decade, TB treatment still comes with several side effects and requires taking multiple different medicines, typically for six or more months. The search for better TB medicines got a boost last week with the presentation of promising findings from a study conducted in South Africa on an experimental drug called quabodepistat. Elri Voigt reports on this and other TB studies presented at the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) in Denver, Colorado.

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Pilot project in SA now offering HIV prevention injection

Pilot project in SA now offering HIV prevention injection

A new HIV prevention injection is now available to a select number of people in South Africa. That a single shot provides two months of protection is one of the injection’s major selling points. In this story, Elri Voigt unpacks how much of the jab is available, who is choosing to get it and what other anti-HIV drugs are being rolled out.

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There is a ‘worrying’ resurgence of sexually transmitted infections in Gauteng

There is a ‘worrying’ resurgence of sexually transmitted infections in Gauteng

There’s a resurgence of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in South Africa and around the world. The Gauteng Department of Health recently reported an increase of newly acquired STIs, in particular gonorrhoea and chlamydia. This spike in cases call for management guidelines and awareness programmes to be reviewed, reports Ufrieda Ho.

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EDITORIAL | With elections and NHI, this is a big year for healthcare in SA

EDITORIAL | With elections and NHI, this is a big year for healthcare in SA

South Africa is barrelling towards its most consequential and most competitive national and provincial elections since 1994. Spotlight editor Marcus Low asks what is on the line in these elections from a healthcare perspective and argues that the stakes are particularly high when it comes to NHI and the Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal provincial health departments.

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Yogan Pillay | This is how SA can meet its HIV targets

Yogan Pillay | This is how SA can meet its HIV targets

To respond to the call to end AIDS by 2030, Dr Yogan Pillay argues it is firstly critical to agree on what we mean by ending AIDS. Secondly, he suggests it is important to have accurate and granular data that can inform a more targeted approach to reaching those people that the health system typically does not reach.

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Analysis: Where we are with NIMART 13 years later

Analysis: Where we are with NIMART 13 years later

Once South Africa had closed the door on state-sponsored AIDS denialism in 2008, a critical question was how to offer HIV treatment to as many eligible people as possible as quickly as possible. Given that the health system did not have enough doctors for the job, it was decided in 2010 to rope in nurses to help out. Tiyese Jeranji asks where things stand with Nurse Initiated and Managed Antiretroviral treatment (NIMART) 13 years later.

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Interview: “I used that anger to feed my activist’s soul,” says former TAC General Secretary

Interview: “I used that anger to feed my activist’s soul,” says former TAC General Secretary

In 2001, at age 22, Vuyiseka Dubula-Majola joined the Treatment Action Campaign in its fight to bring antiretrovirals to South Africa. Today, she walks the streets of Geneva in Switzerland to get to her job as head of the Global Fund’s community, rights and gender department. Biénne Huisman spoke with Dubula-Majola about her remarkable journey, balancing activism with diplomacy, and the struggle “to build and regain the dignity of poor people around the globe”.

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Integrating HIV and NCD care is critical but not straight-forward, clinicians say

Integrating HIV and NCD care is critical but not straight-forward, clinicians say

With the remarkable success of antiretroviral treatment people living with HIV in South Africa are generally living much longer than they did two decades ago. As a result, more people with HIV are also now living with non-communicable diseases (NCDs) such as diabetes and hypertension. Accordingly, the need to better integrate HIV and NCD services was a hot topic at the recent Southern African HIV Clinicians Society conference in Cape Town. Elri Voigt reports.

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Opinion: SA can’t afford proposed cuts to HIV funding

Opinion: SA can’t afford proposed cuts to HIV funding

National Treasury has proposed a R1 billion cut to HIV funding. This has come about because – rather than seeing the reduced price of antiretroviral treatment as an opportunity to scale up treatment coverage and strengthen other interventions to address the HIV epidemic – the Department of Health has seen it as an opportunity for cost-containment. However, the HIV epidemic is not over and savings owing to cost reductions should not simply be returned to Treasury, argue Matshidiso Lencoasa and Mila Harding.

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Interview: From a pig farm in Zim to star HIV researcher- Prof LGB reflects on her remarkable journey

Interview: From a pig farm in Zim to star HIV researcher- Prof LGB reflects on her remarkable journey

Inside Professor Linda-Gail Bekker’s office a bookshelf is stacked with titles on general medicine, HIV and tuberculosis. Against the bookshelf, a mannequin leans dressed in a white doctor’s coat, sparkling tiara and pink Venetian mask, with a stethoscope protruding from her pocket. Known to colleagues as LGB, Bekker is one of South Africa’s top HIV researchers. Biénne Huisman chatted to Bekker about her remarkable career, finding new ways to reach young people, her love of both art and science and the thinking behind the slogan “get ripped, get prepped”.

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