Steven Lang
GRAHAMSTOWN, May 2 2008 (IPS) – More people have died of cholera following recent floods in Mozambique than the number of those who perished in the rising floodwaters. Most rivers in central and northern Mozambique burst their banks after heavy rains in December, January and February, and as a result of Cyclone Jokwe which hit in early March.
Exact figures are not readily available, but it is believed that about dozen people lost their lives in the floods, while three were eaten by crocodiles that had escaped their usual habitats. However, the international relief organisation, Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders, MSF), says that at least 72 people have died of cholera and an equal number because of other waterborne diseases such as dysentery.
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Bernarda Claure* – Tierramérica
BAHÍA DE COHANA, Bolivia, Jun 7 2008 (IPS) – Nobody doubts that Lake Titicaca, a watershed and resource shared by Bolivia and Peru, is polluted. But a half-century after the two governments realised there was a problem there are still no detailed studies of the state of its waters.
Cattle drink from the Sewanka River, polluted with sewage from El Alto, Bolivia. Credit: Bernarda Claure
The six mo…
Peter Hirschberg
JERUSALEM, Jul 9 2008 (IPS) – Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has laid it out in the starkest possible terms for his fellow Israelis. If they do not relinquish control of the occupied territories, he has warned them, Israel will ultimately cease to exist as a Jewish and democratic state.
If Israel does not extract itself from the West Bank and a Palestinian state is not established alongside the Jewish state, he said in an interview late last year, Israel will find itself trapped in an apartheid-like reality. The day will come when the two-state solution collapses and we face a South African-style struggle for equal voting rights, he said. As soon as that happens, the state of Israel is finished.
Olmert s conviction is driven by what many Israelis…
Interview with Pedro Cahn, outgoing president of Int’l AIDS Society* – Tierramérica
BUENOS AIRES, Aug 6 2008 (IPS) – A greater commitment to universal access to anti-HIV therapies and to the defence of health workers in impoverished countries are two achievements noted by Argentine physician Pedro Cahn as president of the scientific society that organised the XVII International AIDS Conference.
Dr.…
Danstan Kaunda
LUSAKA, Sep 26 2008 (IPS) – Sometimes there is barely any food at home, so I only eat at school, at lunch, said Justin Banda, a 12 year old student, at Chikumboso school in Lusaka s Ngombe township.
The high price of food threatens a vital school feeding programme. Credit: Danstan Kaunda/IPS
The Chikumboso community school is an informal school run by the local community. It is also one of the 400 sites of a school feeding programme jointly run by th…
Wambi Michael
KAMPALA, Nov 18 2008 (IPS) – We have lots of orders for apple banana. There is a ready market for kibuzi in London. It is eaten from Monday to Monday. But how to get it there is the issue. Almost 60 percent of the cost goes to freight.
Bananas being loaded in Masaka, central Uganda. Credit: Wambi Michael/IPS
This is one of James Kanyije s main complaints. He is the director of Icemark Africa, a leading Ugandan company that exports vegetables and fruit, including bananas. Bananas for cooking, c…
SAN FRANCISCO, Jan 15 2009 (IPS) – Eighteen U.S. veterans kill themselves every day. More veterans are committing suicide than are dying in combat overseas. One in every three homeless men in the United States has put on a uniform and served his country. On any given night, the U.S. government estimates 200,000 veterans sleep on the street.
This is the crisis General Eric Shinseki will inherit when he takes the reins at the Department of Veterans Affairs. The general, who retired from the Army after the George W. Bush administration ignored his warnings on Iraq, sat for his Senate confirmation hearing for VA secretary Wednesday, where he received accolades from Democrats and Republicans alike.
The chair of the committee, Senator Daniel Akaka of Hawaii, predicted Shinseki wi…
Zofeen Ebrahim*
KHARO CHAAN, Sindh, Feb 28 2009 (IPS) – Sitting on a rickety bench outside the dispensary of Dr. Abdul Jalil at Deh Bublo, Issa Mallah, a centenarian, watches the world go by. He says he comes to this city everyday to buy his groceries.
As Indus waters are diverted upstream, steady ingress of sea water into the delta has upset its delicate ecology. Credit: Zofeen Ebrahim/IPS
Jalil is…
Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Apr 1 2009 (IPS) – The spreading global financial crisis is threatening to undermine another one of the U.N. s major development and health goals: family planning.
United Nations officials are expressing fears that planned funding for reproductive health services may fall short of its target.
According to the latest figures released here, international donor assistance to population activities continued to increase over the years 7.4 billion dollars in 2006 rising to about 8.1 billion dollars in 2007.
The projected funding for 2008 and 2009 was estimated at about 11.1 and 11.2 billion dollars, respectively.
However, given the current global financial crisis, it is not certain whether donors will live up to their expected fu…
Cam McGrath
CAIRO, May 5 2009 (IPS) – It is a health crisis of alarming proportions. Up to nine million Egyptians have been exposed to hepatitis C, and tens of thousands will die each year unless they receive a liver transplant.
Health authorities are taking steps to stop the spread of the blood-borne virus, but must also contend with higher liver failure mortality rates as the disease advances in those infected decades ago.
The prevalence of hepatitis C is not growing, but the impact of an outbreak in the 1960s and 70s is appearing now as a clinical outcome, says Dr. Mostafa Kamal Mohamed, professor of community medicine at Ain Shams University in Cairo. Liver disease has become the number one healthcare priority for the country and will continue to be so for the ne…