health - "national hiv"

Inter Press Service 9 August 2008 Joshua Kyalimpa Kampala Uganda's approach to the fight against HIV/AIDS is under scrutiny by activists.

Emerging research suggests younger service members and Reserve and national Guard combat personnel returning from the war are at increased risk of new-onset heavy drinking, binge drinking and other alcohol-related problems. Substance abuse is strongly associated with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other psychological disorders that may occur after stressful and traumatic events, such [...]

Cutaneous leishmaniasis, a disease characterized by painful skin ulcers, occurs when the parasite Leishmania major, or a related species, is transmitted to a mammalian host by the bite of an infected sand fly. In a new study from the national Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the national Institutes of health, scientists have discovered L. major does its damage by not only evading but also by exploiting the body's wound-healing response to sand fly bites, as reported in the August 15 issue of 'Science.'

A survey of 12-to-17-year-olds conducted by the national Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University revealed that teens are finding it increasingly easy to obtain prescription drugs, and 'problem parents' may be contributing to their teens' drug use.

Three heart transplants involving babies have provoked an ethical debate over the circumstances under which organs should be removed.

West Virginia officials have reported that because of hard-core tobacco use in some of the state's poorest households, children on the state's Women, Infants and Children program rolls are exposed to secondhand smoke at twice the national average.

Although Yemen -- which has recorded 2,431 HIV/AIDS cases -- is considered one of the countries with the lowest number of people living with the disease worldwide, some organizations, including the country's national AIDS Control Program, say that the numbers likely do not accurately reflect the true number of people living with HIV/AIDS in the country, the Yemen Times reports.

An hiv-positive woman who has never shown symptoms of the virus might provide insights into HIV/AIDS vaccine development, researchers from Johns Hopkins University said in a study recently published in the Journal of Virology, Reuters reports.read more

People with schizophrenia have an alteration in a pattern of brain electrical activity associated with learning and memory. Now, researchers from the national Institutes of health and Sweden's Karolinska Institute have identified in mouse brain tissue a molecular switch that, when thrown, increases the strength of this electrical pattern. the researchers found that adding the brain chemical Neuregulin-1 to the brain tissue boosted the electrical signals that the tissue generated.read more

Although antiretroviral medications are provided at no cost in Mozambique and access to the drugs is 'relatively easy,' large numbers of hiv-positive Mozambicans are dropping out of treatment programs because of a lack of food, Medecins Sans Frontieres said recently, IRIN/Plus News reports.