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In-depth: Getting Gauteng’s HIV and TB response back on track

Posted in: Edition 10: Drug-resistant TB, Edition 12: SA’s AIDS & TB response, Edition 7: TB, Edition 9: State of HIV, Gauteng, Latest, Provinces, TB

From March to July this year, the Gauteng Department of Health recorded 57 848 TB tests – a decrease of about 30 000 tests compared to the same period last year. The province performed better with HIV testing, although the HIV response has faltered in other areas. Melissa Javan makes sense of the province’s numbers and speaks to activists and community health workers about the impact of lockdown on their services and plans to get things back on track.  

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From the frontlines: 20 years of fighting HIV in Khayelitsha

Posted in: Edition 12: SA’s AIDS & TB response, Edition 6: HIV & teens, Edition 8: NSP in general, Edition 9: State of HIV, HIV/AIDS, Latest

Two decades since Doctors without Borders (MSF) started its HIV programme in Khayelitsha, the organisation will start wrapping up its operations. Siyabonga Kamnqa spoke to some people living with HIV who benefitted from this programme and who now work as activists about developments over the last 20 years.

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‘Welcome Back Service’ aims to help people get back on HIV treatment

Posted in: HIV/AIDS, Latest

While South Africa is doing well on some of the UNAIDS HIV targets for 2020, one target we are set to miss is ensuring that 90% of people diagnosed with HIV are on antiretroviral therapy. Partly in response to this problem, the ‘Welcome back’ campaign started by Doctors without Borders aims to make it easier for people who have stopped taking treatment to restart. Tiyese Jeranji reports.

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Opinion: When civil society can’t do its work, adherence to HIV treatment dips.

Posted in: Edition 12: SA’s AIDS & TB response, Edition 8: NSP in general, Edition 9: State of HIV, HIV/AIDS, Latest, Limpopo, Provinces, SRHR

If South Africa is forced to go into a COVID-19 lockdown again, HIV support groups and adherence clubs should remain functional to make sure that everyone is supported, has regular access to information and treatment, and that people are motivated to adhere to treatment, argue Annah Maluleke and Solanga Milambo.

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Reimagining health in the Eastern Cape: A dysfunctional public health system is not inevitable

Posted in: Eastern Cape, Healthcare system, Latest, NHI

The persistent challenges in public health in the Eastern Cape, highlight the critical role of leadership. Prof Helen Schneider argues if we are to reimagine a future of access, equity and justice in health and health care in the Eastern Cape, we need bottom-up institution-building involving civil society and not just top-down legislative, budgetary and other reforms.

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Eastern Cape government mum on TB plans and numbers

Posted in: Eastern Cape, Edition 10: Drug-resistant TB, Edition 13: Eastern Cape Health, Edition 7: TB, Latest, Provinces, TB

Numbers from the National Institute of Communicable Disease and from some provinces show that TB diagnoses have dropped dramatically in 2020 – likely due to COVID-19 and the related lockdown. The Eastern Cape Department of Health has however declined to share information on the TB situation in the province and their catch-up plans. Some activists are concerned about the situation. Luvuyo Mehlwana reports.

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