Tuberculosis (TB) can be cured, but completing TB treatment can sometimes be difficult. Treatment takes a minimum of six months and some of the medicines have side effects – especially those used to treat drug-resistant forms of TB. Tiyese Jeranji asks what role smart pill boxes could play in helping people complete TB treatment.
In 2015, the World Health Organization recommended a urine test that helps with the detection of tuberculosis (TB) in people living with HIV who are hospitalised or who have compromised immune systems. While uptake of this test in South Africa was initially quite slow, numbers presented at the recent South African TB Conference suggest that the use of the test is now increasing. Tiyese Jeranji reports.
South Africa is among the most unequal countries in the world with a huge quadruple burden of disease and to address this we need hands. Professor Parimalaranie Yogeswaran argues that we should maximise the untapped potential of clinical associates to beef up the clinical health workforce.
South Africa has only one public sector supplier of resized packages of morphine powder and the company’s failure to deliver since July has left some patients in unspeakable agony. Ufrieda Ho reports.
A potentially life-saving or life-extending breast cancer medicine is available to public sector patients in several of South Africa’s provinces, but not in the Western Cape. Elri Voigt asks what is behind the Western Cape government’s decision.
South Africa last published comprehensive guidelines for the management of childhood tuberculosis (TB) in 2013. Almost a decade later, the guidelines are being updated to recommend a shortened TB treatment regimen for most children with pulmonary TB. Catherine Tomlinson reports.
South Africa’s tuberculosis (TB) testing numbers have recovered from dramatic declines in 2020, delegates heard at the opening of the 7th South African TB Conference in Durban. The Department of Health also provided some details of its TB recovery plans and targets. Tiyese Jeranji reports from Durban.
COVID-19 vaccine doses destined to be binned next month are “a shocking indictment” and questions need to be asked about just how effective the country’s vaccination drive has been, some public health experts say. Ufrieda Ho reports.
The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) elected new leadership at its recently held seventh national congress. Thabo Molelekwa attended the congress and asked TAC leaders about the organisation’s focus in 2022 and beyond.
South Africa is seeing fewer medication stockouts than in previous years but contraception shortages continue to be a problem in the country, according to a new report from the Stop Stockouts Project. Injectables, the most widely used method in South Africa, accounted for three-quarters of contraception stockouts reported. Aisha Abdool Karim unpacks what this means for women’s sexual and reproductive health.
It is estimated that in 2021, around 0.3% of sexually active people in the Western Cape were taking antiretroviral medicines to prevent HIV infection. This is substantially lower than the national estimate of 1%. Elsabé Brits asks why uptake in the Western Cape is lagging behind most other provinces.
One of the hot topics at the recently concluded AIDS 2022 conference held in Montreal, Canada, was how HIV prevention interventions such as pills or injections that prevent HIV infection should be made available to different groups of people. Tiyese Jeranji spoke to some local experts and an activist about the rich set of discussions.
