Europe

UNITED KINGDOM – Midway through Britain’s 10-year plan to improve treatment of its elderly population, a group of watchdog agencies are complaining that the National Health Service is still not doing enough to protect its older population. Citing a survey in which 80% of seniors reported dissatisfaction with the country’s health priorities, British health advocates argue that the government is overlooking public transportation and mental health care concerns. Of the ten communities the watch-dog groups studied, none have managed to meet the targets set out in the government’s improvement plan. According to Anna Walker, chief executive of the Healthcare Commission, “Older people are the biggest users of healthcare…yet they continue to be a low priority in both the planning and development of our health service.” In response, the government has highllighted its success in reducing incidents of age discrimination and insists that new plans to address elderly issues are under development.

GERMANY – According to a report in the journal Nature, researchers in Germany have successfully harvested embryonic stem cells from the testes of male mice. Stem cells, which have the ability to differentiate into any type of cell or tissue, can evidently be removed from mice using a relatively easy extraction method, a process which could pave the way for similar successes in harvesting stem cells from humans. Scientists hope that embryonic stem cells could be used to grow personalized replacement tissue using the patient’s own DNA. The study’s author believes that the new discovery could lead to a new therapeutic strategy for treating people, but he also emphasizes that mice and human cells are very different. The issue of embryonic stem cell research is a controversial one because up until now, harvesting the cells has required the destruction of cloned human embryos. The United States banned federally funded scientists from destroying human embryos in 2001. The European experiment, which took place under even more severe German government restrictions, failed to find a similar potential for stem cells in females.

Africa

SOUTH AFRICA – South Africa’s Ministry of Health is taking new steps to combat the spread of tuberculosis in its provinces. In addition to plans for improving staff, management, and access to laboratory services, the government intends to create a network of local TB action teams to educate the public and raise awareness through both grassroots communication and a national, mass-media, information campaign. Teams will focus on highly infected provinces, as well as large urban centers such as Johannesburg.

ZAMBIA – Imagine a crowd of AIDS patients so weak from the double-threat of disease and malnutrition that they need to be transported to clinics in wheelbarrows. Until recently, this was the reality outside the Kanyama Health Center’s anti-retroviral clinic in Lusaka, Zambia, where a new food program has brought much-needed relief to sick patients. Several organizations, including the UN World Food Programme and Catholic Relief Services have banded together to provide food assistance for the drought-ridden, AIDS-ravaged region. Highly toxic anti-retroviral drugs require a 40% increase in caloric intake for a patient to tolerate them, but many patients in Lusaka struggle to meet even normal daily needs.

Americas

MEXICO – Global health officials fear that a new alliance between the tobacco industry and the Mexican government could undermine the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. The agreement, signed in 2004, ties tobacco control measures and industry contributions to a program that offers assistance for people without health insurance, Seguro Popular de Salud. Signed by two Ministry of Health agencies and three international tobacco companies, the agreement includes small limitations on the size of billboard advertisements but also restricts the government’s ability to print health warnings and to disclose ingredient information. The agreement also protects the tobacco industry from having to reveal “industrial secrets and confidential information,” which extends to ingredient lists. These clauses violate major components of the Framework Convention on Tobacco control, which Mexico ratified only days before it signed its agreement with the tobacco industry. Supporters of the alliance say that the Mexican government is using the money from the tobacco industry to finance much needed medical care. Despite the agreement, the government is still taking steps to decrease tobacco use by taxing tobacco products and by funding advertising campaigns aimed at discouraging tobacco use. Opponents fear that the Framework Convention will be weakened if other countries follow Mexico’s lead and start forming alliances with the tobacco industry.

VENEZUELA – A 33 year-old airline pilot who became sick after traveling to Madrid is reportedly at the center of Venezuela’s first measles outbreak in four years. According to Venezula’s Ministry of Health, 12 measles cases have already been confirmed and another four are under investigation. Since the countries of Americas pledged to eradicate measles in 1994, Venezuela has administered over 67,000 vaccines and has intensified its surveillance and education efforts. The result had been a 99% reduction in the incidence of measles until the latest outbreak. Dr. Jon Andrus, chief of the Pan American Health Organization’s Immunization Unit said, “As long as measles eradication is not pursued globally, imported or import-related measles cases will continue to occur in the Americas.”

Asia

INDIA – According to a recent report in the British medical journal The Lancet, Southern India has managed to cut its HIV rates by one-third since 2000. India has an estimated 5.1 million people with HIV, three-fourths of whom reside in the country’s southern provinces. Researchers tracked the incidence of HIV infection in women by conducting tests at prenatal clinics between 2000 and 2004. Men were tested during the same period at STD clinics. The study found a relative decline of thirty-six percent for women aged 15-24 and of thirty-five percent for men aged 20-29. Researchers are confidant that the decrease in HIV prevalence indicates a reduction in transmission rather than simply the attrition of those already with AIDS. The decline is attributed to increased condom usage among men visiting sex workers–a trade that occurs predominately in the south.