God, AIDS, Africa & HOPE

Reflections / Gedanken

02/07/2014 • 8:25 am Comments Off on PreP – one does not hear a lot about it…

PreP – one does not hear a lot about it…

“We don’t know the side effects of this drug. It’s too expensive. Insurance won’t cover it. It hasn’t been studied enough. It will encourage slutty behavior. And why the hell don’t people just use condoms?”
Sounds familiar? That has been the objections raised to the oral contraceptive progesterone (“The Pill”), approved by the FDA 54 years ago. And it seems that with Truvada as an alternative method to prevent a HIV infection it started similar. Pre-exposure prophylaxis would add to more sexual contacts, critics claimed and they painted the picture of orgies and inhibited sex lives. In an article at TheBody.com Mark S King tries to tackle all those concerns and to come up with a new assessment about the drug and its benefits and disadvantages as a prophylaxis.
To read more go to TheBody.com.

Damon L Jacobs from New York tackles this topic from a more practical side. He decided to take Truvada as PrEP since 2011 and reports on his findings in an article on this blog. As he is also a psychotherapist and safe sex educator in NY and SF it is indeed an interesting read. For more go to the blog.

The question is obviously whether PrEp would also function in South Africa and what the financial implications would be, if insurance companies and even government would consider this to be offered on a wider scale. This is certainly up to a debate which we have to start sooner than later.

Filed under: General, HIV and AIDS, HIV Prevention, HIV Treatment, Medical and Research, Reflection, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

02/04/2014 • 9:04 am Comments Off on Philip Seymour Hoffman death is speaking volumes

Philip Seymour Hoffman death is speaking volumes

Another actor dead as a result of drug use; it seems that celebrities and public persons have more possibilities to entertain drug use, even confessing to it, getting clean only to start all over again. Fame seems not to translate into a happy life but into depression and yearning for more and the ultimate kick. All those stories tell us about a tragedy of being put on a pedestal and the assumption, that money and VIP treatment creates happiness in life. From Withney Houston, Amy Winehouse to Heath Ledger and Chris Kelly – they all tell the story of stars  at the end not able to connect to real life; and personalities, whose need for excitement, paired with unlimited finances and so-called VIP friends brought on a lifestyle that often breeds addiction.
It leaves the question what really carries us through life? Is it money, fame or at the end such simple things like love, good friends, a lover holding on to the person even in bad times?
For me such tragedies show how life can be wasted by slipping into an artificial life style often fostered by the need to have again and again a new story for all these celebrity magazines which live and strive of the curiosity of its readers.  So at the end it is the mixture of extreme personalities and perceived society demands which creates the need for drugs and prescribed medication leading to early death.
How far away is from this the daily struggle of those we cater for at HOPE Cape Town. It seems so far away, but at the end, it boils down to the same human experience: anxiety, yearning for love and acknowledgement, the feeling of loneliness and the cry for help in one or the other way. Celebrity person in Hollywood and a person in the townships of Cape Town:  when it comes to emotions, there is a certain similarity for sure.

Filed under: General, Reflection, Society and living environment, Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

01/30/2014 • 7:39 am Comments Off on PEPFAR and the Catholic Church

PEPFAR and the Catholic Church

A street in Hillbrow, Johannesburg.

A street in Hillbrow, Johannesburg. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I am visiting Johannesburg and a Catholic institution asking for assistance in a difficult situation. The Catholic Church in South Africa has mainly relied on one big sponsor in the last years: PEPFAR, the US American President’s emergency fund. This was done for several reasons; one being that in the beginning it excluded any condom distribution or work with prostitution as a precondition for receiving these funds. There has been very much debate around it at World AIDS Conferences at times as this resulted in some countries showing a clear increase of infections again. Nevertheless, with the money lots of good was also done, amongst others instituting the distribution of antiretrovirals for thousands of South Africans.
The funds now drying up and so the Church is forced to transfer its patients to the governmental facilities with different results. As specially in Johannesburg also quite a big number of asylum seekers still without papers are among those catered for, these people would anyhow not be eligible for continuation of treatment in a primary health care facility.
So the need for special funding to at least get one doctor looking after those patients is needed and hopefully there is a way to support this for the new year.
From what I have seen and heard it seems that for many patients it is a bitter reality check: coming from church run clinics which really went the extra mile for a patient to ensure his or her health, governmental facilities are mostly overcrowded and not able to cope in this way with their patients. Experts fear, that people will be lost in transition or get lost in transition.This shows once again how important the support of the Catholic Church in providing medical services has been and it is to decry that lack of funding forces closure and that – at least in Johannesburg – the government now refuses to deliver antiretroviral medication as a matter of principle to NGO run medical facilities even if they could continue – forcing so the transfer in a way too often not beneficial for the patients.

With a generation of young people being born HIV positive and with the treat of resistance looming like we have seen it with TB, this country needs the continuation of support from all corners of society. Even if there is the growing impression that we have conquered and beaten the deadly pandemic, it might be too early to come to this conclusion. So it is really to hope that also the churches try their utmost to continue as many services as possible to give those infected and affected all necessary support.

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Filed under: Catholic Church, HIV and AIDS, HIV Prevention, HIV Treatment, Networking, Reflection, Religion and Ethics, Society and living environment, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

01/24/2014 • 12:48 pm Comments Off on Politics can produce drug resistance

Politics can produce drug resistance

It will be a hot and contested election year in South Africa – and the heat is starting to be felt with all the manifestos and declarations but also toi-toi’s and service delivery protests. The DA want’s to march towards Luthuli House, Khayelitsha residence fight for better sanitation systems, AMCU is on strike again at the Platinum mines – people are going for their convictions onto the streets and politics one or the other way dictates for a lot of people how they spend their days. The question I would like to ask is whether with all those emotions boiling over are people still taking care of their health? Do people have time to go to the clinics to take their TB medication; do they think of appointments with doctors and nursing staff and do they take their anti-retroviral treatment as prescribed if they are in need of it?

We often hear that in times of unrest, civil war health issues are on the back-burner when it comes to people’s minds – often they don’t have the opportunity to organize their health related obligations to keep fit. But I believe even on the low-level of service delivery protests and strikes and marches we can see the problem arising of not adherence to life saving medication. We pride ourselves to put more and more people on those medication but we seem not to be able to ensure the proper compliance when politics takes over. With 2 million and still counting for example on anti-retroviral treatment, there must be a concern about their well-being in those heated days.
When we saw the poo-protesters on the N2 motorway many times last year – those questions of adherence and compliance were always on my mind. Knowing how big the restrains are already on the health system we can’t effort more resistant bugs. And reading this morning about the thoughts of government officials to let people pay if they self-inflict their health problems – non-compliance because of toi-toi might be also falling soon under that label. It might sound far-fetched – but country and society are in such a crazy mood in many quarters – let’s work together that we care about compliance and adherence, be it TB or HIV or any other of those disease bringing down a person if not treated in a proper way.

Filed under: General, HIV and AIDS, HIV Treatment, Politics and Society, Reflection, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

01/02/2014 • 10:28 am Comments Off on Young adults born with HIV and parenthood challenges

Young adults born with HIV and parenthood challenges

As children born with HIV age into adulthood, they need guidance facing the additional challenges the virus poses if they consider becoming a parent. Especially in Southern Africa, where a whole generation of HIV positive want-t0-be-parents are growing up it is from utmost importance to face the upcoming problems and challenges. It’s not only about sexual encounters but responsible parenthood and dealing with the still existing stigma of being a HIV positive parent. Researchers at Royal Holloway University and St. Mary’s Hospital, London published their findings about this subject in the journal AIDS Care. I guess more should be done on this topic and I urge especially the churches to take on this topic – as a serious challenge for the parents, but also for the way, churches see sexuality and what goes with it. There is a common learning curve visible and is awaiting that we take the challenge.

Here you can find a brief resume of the write-up on the website of the Royal Holloway University in London / Great Britain. Click here.

Filed under: Catholic Church, General, HIV and AIDS, Religion and Ethics, Society and living environment, Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , ,

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