Natasha Bolognesi

CAPE TOWN, Nov 27 2006 (IPS) – The 11th conference of the International Society for Telemedicine and eHealth (ISfTeH) kicked off Monday at the International Convention Centre in Cape Town, South Africa, where delegates from around the globe gathered to discuss the benefits and challenges that eHealth (electronic health) offers to both the developed and developing world.
It is the first time the annual ISfTeH gathering has been held in Africa, and in the words of the society s president, Michael Nerlich, The event should allow for increasing recognition of telemedicine and eHealth in developing countries, particularly those in Africa.

Telemedicine is the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) such as mobile phone text messages, e-ma…

Suvendrini Kakuchi

TOKYO, Mar 14 2007 (IPS) – Three months after a private Japanese hospital proposed the setting up of a baby hatch to save unwanted infants, conservative officials continue to resist its launch in what critics say illustrates indifference to female reproductive rights in this tradition-bound country.
Dubbed cradle-of-storks , the baby hatch would allow infants to be deposited anonymously. It was proposed by the Jikei Hospital, a Catholic facility that does not perform abortions and is located in Kumamoto city, southern Japan.

Opposition is based mostly on the grounds that a baby hatch might encourage an increase in the number of babies abandoned by parents. But it is also for such reasons as that the facility is called a baby post in the translation …

Lynette Corporal* – IPS/Newsmekong

BANGKOK, Apr 15 2007 (IPS) – Grade 7 student Sakulrathna Muadkum says she knows what avian influenza is. I saw posters of it and I will simply not eat chicken that died of the flu, the pupil at Watnuannoradit School, here in Thai capital, said nonchalantly.
Over in Ranong in southern Thailand, a shy Htet Htet said in his native Burmese: My teacher told us to wash our hands often so we don t get sick. I will also not eat chicken if I think it died of bird flu.

The 12-year-old student of Victoria Learning Centre in Ranong, a southern Thai province on the border with Burma, added that he has seen colourful posters about bird flu in his community.

Efforts like these to reach young people and inform them about how to prevent the …

Ignatius Banda

BULAWAYO, May 24 2007 (IPS) – Judith Moyo is unable to give her child enough food. She has to bring her 18-month-old daughter to a council clinic for check-ups every month because of what nurses call her slow development .
I give her isitshwala leftovers from the previous night, 33-year-old Moyo says as she tries to keep the child quiet. Isitshwala is a staple thick porridge prepared from maize meal.

The fourth of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) seeks a two-third reduction in the deaths of children under five by 2015. But the issues related to the first MDG, the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger, will push the reduction of child mortality in Zimbabwe beyond the target date of 2015.

Despite President Robert Mugabe …

Adrianne Appel

BOSTON, Jul 25 2007 (IPS) – A U.S. health agency has made research subjects of people in tiny Mossville, Louisiana by repeatedly monitoring dangerously high levels of dioxin in their blood while doing nothing to get the community out of harm s way, residents say.

Cemetery in Mossville, Louisiana, with Condea Vista polyvinyl plant in background. Credit: Greenpeace/Stone

Further, the agency failed to release important test results for five ye…

Suvendrini Kakuchi* – IPS/TerraViva

COLOMBO, Aug 23 2007 (IPS) – For Padma, a sociology graduate from a Sri Lankan university, the three-day International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific (ICAAP) that ended Thursday was nothing short of an enlightening experience in her life.

Next ICAAP Set For Bali Credit:

When I arrived at the conference, I was filled with fear and prejudice against people with HIV and AIDS. But now, I hold a totally different view. Thanks to the large amount of information available to me here, I no longer fear eating with or using toilets that have already been visited by positive pe…

Diego Cevallos

MEXICO CITY, Nov 19 2007 (IPS) – Miguel Fernández was a police officer in the Mexican capital who used and sold cocaine and crack for 18 years in collusion with his superiors and colleagues. Now he runs a small rehabilitation centre for addicts, where the Bible and God s healing power are the treatment of choice.
God bless you, is Fernández s standard greeting. I was more of a drug dealer than a cop, and I was on the point of committing suicide because of my addiction. But God rescued me from hell, so I decided to help others, he told IPS.

The 43-year-old former police officer and drug trafficker is a combination of rehabilitation counsellor and Christian evangelist. Since 2002 he has treated 408 addicts, and says that half of them succeeded in kicki…