U.N. grants Mozambique $496 million in aid

MAPUTO, Aug 10 (Reuters) - The United Nations will grant Mozambique $496 million in aid over the next two years to boost the country's efforts to develop its economy, improve governance and fight against AIDS, an official said on Friday.

U.N. communications officer in Mozambique Luis Zaqueu told Reuters the world body would give $156 million to develop human capital, $119 million on governance, $118 on economic development and $103 million to fight AIDS.

Half of Mozambique's 2007 budget of $2.8 billion is financed by donors helping the former Portuguese colony rebuild after decades of a civil war that ended in the 1990s.

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Youths learn from others' experiences; HIV-AIDS conference gives young people forum for discussion

The 22-year-old youth worker from Nipissing First Nation said she picked up a few lessons to share while attending the Respect Yourself, Protect Yourself HIV-AIDS Conference at Best Western North Bay.

Conditions of poverty in the inner city and on reserves lead to self-destructive lifestyles, with HIV transmission rampant among addicts sharing needles and those involved in the sex trade.

A Canadore College student who started taking early childhood education and continued into the social work program, she said the best part of the conference was hearing from people who knew what they were talking about. read more

Ambrilia Announces Second Quarter 2007 Results and Provides Update on Development Program

MONTREAL, QUEBEC--(Marketwire - Aug. 10, 2007) - Ambrilia Biopharma Inc. (TSX:AMB), a biopharmaceutical company developing novel small molecules and peptides to treat infectious diseases and cancer, announced today the second quarter 2007 financial results and provided an update on its development program

HIV INTEGRASE INHIBITOR PROGRAM

The preclinical data presented recently at the XVI International HIV Drug Resistance Workshop showed that Ambrilia's new series of integrase inhibitors (pyrazolopyridine compounds) had a good activity against HIV-1 viruses, without significant cytotoxicity.

Furthermore, cross-competition kinetic studies with known competitive strand transfer inhibitors (such as diketo acid compounds) suggested a different mechanism of action, which may lead to a different resistance profile from known strand transfer inhibitors currently in clinical development by pharmaceutical companies. The Company has currently identified a number of lead compounds for optimization and aims to have a potential preclinical drug candidate within the next 12 months.
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Universal Access to HIV treatment Remains a Pipe Dream

The goal of universal access to HIV treatment by 2010 is in danger of being missed, according to a report issued by the International Treatment Preparedness Coalition (ITPC), a coalition of HIV activists from more than 125 countries. The report, titled Missing the Target, said that plans to rapidly expand access to treatment to 10 million people by 2010 would not be successful unless efforts were drastically increased.

"Developing country governments must take on greater leadership on HIV/AIDS. People living with HIV and civil society must engage with their governments and insist they do more. In advocating for change, [people living with HIV] and civil society often face serious challenges and risk," said the report.

It also accused donors of failing to establish a successful formula for securing the regular and reliable funding essential to universal access efforts. ITPC said that funding agencies needed to make more visible efforts towards increasing access to treatment among poorer communities and integrating tuberculosis (TB) and other treatments into health services. read more

Facing the Challenges of HIV/AIDS

In many poor countries, commercial female sex workers are frequently exposed to HIV and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs/STDs). Where sex workers have poor access to health care and HIV prevention services, HIV prevalence can be as high as 50-90%. Evidence shows that targeted prevention interventions in sex work settings can turn the pandemic around.

Bangladesh is a high prevalence of sexually transmitted diseases, particularly among commercial sex workers; there are available injection drug users and sex workers all over the country, low condom use in the general population. Considering the high prevalence of HIV risk factors among the Bangladeshi population, HIV prevention research is particularly important for Bangladesh.

It is very awful, several organization in Bangladesh are working only to prevent HIV/AIDS but few of them like as ‘Rainbow Nari O Shishu Kallyan Foundation’ try to develop proper strategic plane, so should increase research based organization recently.
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Mozambique: CNCS And FAO Sign Agreement

Mozambique's National AIDS Council (CNCS) and the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) signed in Maputo on Tuesday an agreement for the expansion of the project "Junior Farmer Filed and Life Schools", which seeks to improve food security and nutrition among the most vulnerable children.

"Another reason for my satisfaction is the sustainability of the project and its expansion to other Mozambican schools", said Ndolamb Ngokwey.

This program is a joint partnership between the Mozambican Agriculture Ministry, FAO, and the United Nations Programme for HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), and is budgeted at one million USD.read more

Angola: Handball Player Calls for Support to HIV/Aids Infected

Angolan female handball player of the national team, Filomena Trindade Wednesday appealed to Agostinho Neto University's students for non-discrimination of HIV/AIDS infected people, as they are also normal persons and can also take part in sporting events and others activities.

The event, the first of the kind, which aimed at sensitising the university students on HIV/Aids, gathered students of the Higher Institute of Educational Sciences (ISCED).

The Youth and Sports Ministry and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) have set up a commission in charge of holding various activities on Aids in the framework of the Afrobasket to be hosted by Angola on August 15-25, 2007.
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