Denial is always dangerous. But in South Africa , it has proven deadly. Some 4.7 million people there are HIV-positive. That is the highest number living with the prospect of AIDS, or with the disease itself, of any nation in a world where 40 million people are infected. Yet the government of South African President Th
PRETORIA, SOUTH AFRICA -- AIDS activists and pediatricians won a landmark lawsuit against the government Friday, forcing it to provide a key drug to expectant mothers infected with HIV. Activists who packed the court gallery cheered and hugged each other as Judge Chris Botha read a brief judgment stating that the gover
Jeremy Manier, Tribune staff reporter. Tribune staff reporter Michael Higgins contributed to this report
Government regulators took the unprecedented step Thursday of asking a federal court to penalize the American Red Cross for repeated violations of blood safety rules, saying the nation s largest blood supplier has shown a cavalier disregard for the safeguards. The court motion by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration e
Jeremy Manier, Tribune staff reporter. Tribune staff reporter Michael Higgins contributed to this report
Government regulators took the unprecedented step Thursday of asking a federal court to penalize the American Red Cross for repeated violations of blood safety rules, saying the nation s largest blood supplier has shown a cavalier disregard for the safeguards. The court motion by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration e
The organizations for the homeless supported by the Chicago Tribune Holiday Campaign help the kinds of people you would expect to need such help: Victims of domestic violence. People with HIV or AIDS. Formerly incarcerated women. Suburban teenage girls. Pardon? Aren t suburban teenage girls happily ensconced in their c
With the rate of syphilis cases at an all-time low nationwide, public health officials say they are poised to wipe out the disease if they can stamp it out in Cook County and 20 other counties that together accounted for half of all reported cases in 2000. With 326 cases reported in 2000, Cook County had more cases tha
UCLA psychiatrist and sex researcher Gail E. Wyatt isn t the least bit afraid to discuss any taboo issue of sexuality. That s apparent from her comments in a December Vibe magazine article about why HIV-AIDS is the No. 1 killer among African-Americans ages 25 through 44. This is one disturbing reason she said we need t
Well, MTV s The Real World Chicago is folding up its tent, so to speak, heading for that nebulous world of post-taping/pre-broadcast. And the show, which had been taping in Wicker Park from May to Nov. 5, is set to unload at auction all the glorious ready-for-prime-time furnishings that filled the home created by Briti
Ten years have gone by since basketball star Earvin Magic Johnson announced that he had tested positive for HIV, the virus that leads to AIDS. It was a sad and shocking day. Even his cool-natured pal Larry Bird wept. Johnson has long since replaced that sadness with joy and taught the world a lot about the value of hop
A connection between AIDS and a variant of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig s disease, has intrigued researchers looking for ways to treat ALS. Reporting in the Journal Neurology, French researchers described six people afflicted with ALS symptoms among some 1,700 AIDS patients being studied. Also in the jo
In Jonathan Harvey s curious play, Hushabye Mountain is heaven, a place of twinkling stars and dead gay icons. Here, in a cloud of fog, Danny arrives, waiting on the threshold to see if he can gain admittance to the promised land. We see him there only intermittently, and at the final stage of the play. In between, Har
SCHOFIELD, WISCONSIN -- A 16-year-old girl who was born with the AIDS virus has filed a discrimination complaint against her first employer alleging she was fired because of her illness. Korrin Krause worked only one day as a grocery bagger at Quality Foods IGA before the manager called her mother to verify she had HIV
It was 10 years ago that professional basketball player Magic Johnson announced to the world that he had tested positive for the HIV virus that causes the dreaded disease AIDS. Noting the swift passage of time and, more importantly, the fact that the ever-smiling Magic is indeed still among us, is the cover story Life
LOS ANGELES -- As the Bush administration prepares to earmark millions of dollars for sex education that stresses abstinence, a debate has erupted among researchers and teachers over whether such programs steer teenagers away from intercourse but toward other risky sexual activities. Some researchers say that many teen
Former President Bill Clinton called for increased AIDS testing of jail inmates in a keynote speech Wednesday night at the annual convention of the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. Clinton, who has said AIDS is one of the themes shaping his post-presidency, also called for increased prevention, education and treatment of the di
Hope appears to have gone on a long hiatus in Zimbabwe . A country that once offered a promising glimpse of Africa s future now limps along on a 50 percent unemployment rate. The annual rate of inflation tops 60 percent. One-fourth of the population is infected with HIV. Some 500,000 children have been orphaned by AIDS
Andrew Zajac and Bruce Japsen, Tribune staff reporters
Medicaid pays up to one-third more for AIDS drugs than other federal programs do, largely because of a flawed payment system that has plagued the government s two largest medical insurance programs for years, according to a watchdog s report obtained Thursday. The report found that the 16 drugs cost Medicaid $617 milli
Deerfield-based Baxter International Inc. said it has recalled one lot of a product that hospitals use to treat burn victims and patients in shock after a test found a rare form of HIV in the plasma used to make the product. This is being recalled for quality reasons, not safety reasons, said spokeswoman Tanya Tyska. S
Christi Parsons and Ray Long, Tribune staff reporters
SPRINGFIELD -- Gov. George Ryan has signed bills that would require many health insurers to pay for prenatal HIV testing, allow big governmental bodies in Cook County to garnish wages of workers to pay off parking tickets, and authorize installation of an automated system to catch grade-crossing violators in Downers Gr
Christi Parsons and Ray Long, Tribune staff reporters
SPRINGFIELD -- Gov. George Ryan has signed bills that would require many health insurers to pay for prenatal HIV testing, allow big governmental bodies in Cook County to garnish wages of workers to pay off parking tickets, and authorize installation of an automated system to catch grade-crossing violators in Downers Gr
NEW YORK -- Proposed curbs on blood donations could worsen a critical blood shortage in much of the country, many doctors and researchers believe. New restrictions urged last month by a U.S. Food and Drug Administration panel are designed to avert a theoretical spread of mad cow disease by banning the use of blood from
NEW YORK -- Amid the glare of television lights, the Cabinet official predicted that within two years a vaccine for AIDS would be ready for testing. The official was Margaret Heckler, President Ronald Reagan s secretary of health and human services. The year was 1984. Now, no one predicts when a vaccine will be found.
NEW YORK -- While world leaders at a United Nations special session on AIDS called Monday for a united international campaign to fight the epidemic in the developing world, sharp differences quickly became apparent over such sensitive issues as homosexuality. Efforts to reach agreement on a lengthy declaration about th
KAMPALA, Uganda -- Army Maj. Rubaramira Ruranga isn t shy about passing judgment on the historic AIDS summit opening Monday at United Nations headquarters in New York. Brawny and shaven-headed, Rubaramira, a former bush fighter who as a youth hunted elephants with a spear, has little tolerance for what he calls these
NEW YORK -- A former presidential candidate touts the power of Viagra, the prescription drug that combats what is gingerly referred to as erectile dysfunction. A group of young women chat about a pill s effect on their complexion, mentioning almost in passing that the pill also prevents pregnancy. A young couple coo pa
This is how a virus rises from utter anonymity to being one of the world s leading causes of death in just 20 years. It happens one person at a time. The human scale of AIDS can get lost in the staggering numbers the disease has racked up since the medical community first reported its presence in June of 1981. Blazing
When he emigrated from Colombia , Alfonso left behind a culture that placed a powerful stigma on being gay because of its Roman Catholic values and traditional masculine roles. In Hoffman Estates, he found an environment where language barriers and sprawl made it difficult to make connections with other gay men, or any
Jeremy Manier and Achy Obejas, Tribune staff reporters
Twenty years after AIDS (news - web sites) was first recognized as an llness, new research shows young gay men with little memory of the isease s full horror are engaging in unsafe sex and contracting HIV (news web sites) at alarming rates. he problem is urgent among young, gay African-American men, 15 percent of hom a
An unprecedented number of African leaders and health experts gathered in Nigeria last week and declared a state of emergency over the AIDS pandemic that has decimated their continent. That an emergency exists is already obvious, given that two-thirds of the 36.1 million people infected with HIV on the planet live in s
Negative stereotypes and prejudices against homosexuals and drug users continue to stymie efforts to slow the spread of AIDS, and prevention programs must address those biases to halt the rate of transmission, according to national health experts. Too often, the stigma means people delay testing and treatment. Or, when
Abbott Laboratories on Tuesday said it will sell its two HIV drugs in sub-Saharan Africa at cost, bowing to the same international pressures that effectively have convinced several rivals to slash prices for their treatments. Abbott said it has cut the price on its
Federal regulators have warned LifeSource Blood Services, the Chicago area s largest blood collection agency, to fix its bookkeeping problems or face penalties. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said LifeSource lacked documentation to explain why some people appeared to move between lists of eligible and ineligible
WASHINGTON -- When President Bush took office, many conservatives anticipated that with a few strokes of the presidential pen he would overturn a series of unilateral actions by President Bill Clinton, especially a flurry of last-minute orders that infuriated Clinton s critics. One month into his presidency, Bush appea
SPRINGFIELD -- The number of AIDS cases reported in Illinois rose in 2000 for the second year in a row, mostly because doctors and clinics were more diligent in reporting the disease, according to a new state study released Thursday. The state recorded 1,781 cases of AIDS last year, up from 1,557 the year before, said
BETHESDA, Md. -- The search for a vaccine to combat the deadly AIDS virus has led some researchers meeting in Chicago this week in a new and surprising direction -- toward inoculations that won t necessarily prevent infection, but will prevent disease. Some vaccines being tested for AIDS try to prevent a virus from inf
WASHINGTON -- Responding to economic crises in the 1990s and to critics of globalization, the World Bank signaled a shift in its anti-poverty strategy Wednesday toward strengthening social safety nets and giving the poor new tools to escape their plight. The major international financial institution for developing coun
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