Cotonou- Benin (PANA) -- A yearlong programme to control sexually-transmitted diseases has been launched in Benin's transport sector with support from the World Bank. Full text...

Freetown- Sierra Leone (PANA) -- Nurses of all categories serving referral hospitals in Sierra Leone Friday began a nationwide strike in demand for better conditions of service from their government. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- Congo will host the next session of the regional committee of the World Health Organisation (WHO) for Africa, African health ministers decided Thursday in Brazzaville. Full text...

New York- US (PANA) -- Thirty Nigerian families have filed a lawsuit in New York against drug maker, Pfizer for the unethical conduct of clinical tests of an antibiotic drug on children infected with meningitis in Kano in 1996. Full text...

Kigali- Rwanda (PANA) -- Rwanda is set to benefit from the World Bank's assistance in the fight against HIV/AIDS, health officials said in Kigali on Thursday. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- Participants at the ongoing 51st session of the WHO regional committee for Africa Thursday began reviewing the performance of the health systems on the continent, the role of the health sector in poverty eradication and the role of social mobilisation in the fight against diseases. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- World Health Organisation Director General, Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland, has called for improved representation of women among staff members at the health agency's secretariat in Geneva. Full text...

Abidjan- Cote d'Ivoire (PANA) -- The Ivorian ministry of Health and Social Welfare has warned the population against consuming fruit juice and food sold in the street. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- World Health Organisation Director General, Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland, has said that emergencies and conflicts were undermining efforts to improve health in Africa. Full text...

Abidjan- Cote d'Ivoire (PANA) -- Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo on Tuesday visited a village near Yamoussoukro to sympathise with families who lost 25 relatives to food poisoning there, a source at state house in Abidjan said Wednesday. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- WHO Director General, Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland, has proposed an initiative on health and ethics covering the entire WHO system. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- WHO Regional Office for Africa will return 1 October to its original headquarters in Brazzaville, which it vacated in 1997 after the premises were ransacked during the height of the civil war in Congo. Full text...

Cape Town- South Africa (PANA) -- The Department of Health in South Africa's North West Province Wednesday confirmed that a patient from Zeerust District was admitted Monday with Congo haemorrhagic fever at the Ferncrest Hospital. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- Administrators in Kenya's Nyanza province say the rise in HIV/AIDS infection among communities along the Lake Victoria beaches has reached alarming proportions. Full text...

Windhoek- Namibia (PANA) -- The use of Viagra is expected to increase in Namibia during the next few years when Pitzer South Africa opens shop in the country before the end of the year, company sources said. Full text...

Accra- Ghana (PANA) -- An HIV/AIDS drug, Anti Retro Viral drugs (ARV), would soon be manufactured in Ghana for patients at an affordable price, Health minister Richard Anane announced Tuesday in Accra. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- Congolese President Sassou Nguesso has commended the pending the return of the World Health Organisation's regional office for Africa to Brazzaville which he described as its "home base". Full text...

Addis Ababa- Ethiopia (PANA) -- A medical expert has cautioned persons living with HIV/AIDS in Ethiopia against reverting to risky behaviour after getting anti-retroviral drugs. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- WHO Regional Director for Africa, Dr Ebrahim Malick Samba, has described as "satisfactory" the overall health situation in Africa. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- The WHO Regional Office for Africa has budgeted 438 million US dollars for the 2002-2003 period, according to Regional Director Ebrahim Malick Samba. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- From a research conducted in Kenya, American scientists have pioneered a new mosquito net that cuts the death of infants from malaria by 20 percent. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- The 51st session of the World Health Organisation (WHO) regional committee for Africa rolled off Monday in Brazzaville, with the opening proper billed for Tuesday. Full text...

Bamako- Mali (PANA) -- A five-man Libyan medical team has concluded a tour of Bamako and the Malian village Segou, under the framework of the World Islamic Appeal Association. Full text...

Conakry- Guinea (PANA) -- The Guinean national Women's Day, celebrated 27 August, is focusing this year on the fight against AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. Full text...

Praia- Cape Verde (PANA) -- Health Minister Dario Dantas dos Reis is leading Cape Verde's delegation to the 51st WHO African Health Minister's meeting opening Monday in Congo Brazzaville. Full text...

Bujumbura- Burundi (PANA) -- The first phase of Burundi's fifth national polio immunisation campaign has been fairly successful in the capital Bujumbura, but very satisfactory in the rest of the country, health sources said. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- The World Health Organisation will reopen its Africa regional bureau in Brazzaville on 1 October, informed sources said. Full text...

Lome- Togo (PANA) -- The Japanese government has granted 427,350 dollars to Togo in support that country's fight against HIV/AIDS. Full text...

Kampala- Mozambique (PANA) -- Mozambican parliament deputies visiting Uganda said they were impressed by the manner in which Ugandans have openly dealt with issues of sexuality, condom use and the HIV/AIDS epidemic in their efforts to stop the disease. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- Congo would shortly enter into agreements with several pharmaceutical firms to supply the country with reduced priced anti-retrovirals, the minister of Health and Humanitarian Action, Leon Alfred Opimbat, said. Full text...

Lusaka- Zambia (PANA) -- Zambia's average life expectancy at birth has drastically fallen from 43 years in 1996 to 37 today due to high incidences of diseases, particularly the incurable HIV/AIDS, it was learned in Lusaka Wednesday. Full text...

Maputo- Mozambique (PANA) -- Mozambican Deputy Health Minister, Aida Libbombo, Monday called for greater co-operation with the World Health Organisation (WHO). Full text...

Lagos- Nigeria (PANA) -- Availability of information on HIV/AIDS in Nigeria will receive a boost from Tuesday when a Non-Governmental Organisation unveils more HIV/AIDS hotlines in Lagos. Full text...

Addis Ababa- Ethiopia (PANA) -- Some 78 out of 167 people who underwent blood tests in Debre Marcos hospital in East Gojjam Zone of Ethiopia's Amahara State were found HIV positive, health authorities said Sunday. Full text...

Port Louis- Mauritius (PANA) -- Seven years after his demise, a Court in Port Louis has ordered the State of Mauritius to pay damages worth 300 000 rupees (10 344 US dollars) to the parents of a young man who died in circumstances inculpating medics at a public hospital. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- Kenya's Vice President George Saitoti Saturday said the AIDS pandemic was reversing the country' development as the total prevalence HIV rate hit the 13. Full text...

Port Louis- Mauritius (PANA) -- Mauritius Friday launched a National HIV/AIDS Strategic Plan 2001/2005, designed to prevent new infections and step up care for patients. Full text...

Niamey- Niger (PANA) -- Some 248 malaria deaths were recorded in Niger in the last seven months up to 15 August, compared to 427 deaths reported during the same period last year, a senior health official has announced. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- Kenya's Public Health Minister Sam Ongeri Friday expressed optimism that the campaign to eradicate polio in the country in two years would go ahead successfully if the tested and proven house-to-house immunisation campaign strategy was adopted. Full text...

Bamako- Mali (PANA) -- A group of Malian cardiologists, sponsored by National Assembly Speaker Aly Nouhoum Diallo, has set up an Association for the prevention and treatment of high blood pressure, a reliable source said Thursday in Bamako. Full text...

Cape Town- South Africa (PANA) -- Former Mozambican First Lady Graca Machel has urged the Anglican Church to use its strengths to mobilise people in the war against HIV/AIDS. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- Kenya has launched a national HIV/AIDS hotline to provide information on the pandemic to anyone requiring urgent assistance and guidance. Full text...

Lusaka- Zambia (PANA) -- Former Zambian President Kenneth Kaunda and founder of the Kenneth Kaunda Children of Africa Foundation, Wednesday received 100 million kwacha donation from the Zambia Electricity Supply Corporation (ZESCO). Full text...

Yaounde- Cameroon (PANA) -- Delegates from nine central African countries are meeting in Yaounde at the initiative of the World Health Organisation (WHO) to work out a common policy on malaria drugs. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- A body grouping owners of Kenyan private health institutions has unrolled an ambitious plan to supplement government efforts in health care provision in all corners of the country. Full text...

Dar es Salaam- Tanzania (PANA) -- The scourge of AIDS is threatening to erode Tanzania's achievements in child health as an increasing number of children are getting infected by their mothers living with HIV, which causes the incurable disease. Full text...

Cape Town- South Africa (PANA) -- Deputy President Jacob Zuma on Monday lamented that the stigma attached to AIDS had resulted in horrific forms of discrimination and violence including rejection, ridicule and death, for HIV infected individuals and people with AIDS related aliments. Full text...

Kinshasa- DR Congo (PANA) -- UNICEF Executive Director, Carol Bellamy, has called on DR Congo youths to show greater involvement in efforts at solving childhood problems. Full text...

Johannesburg- South Africa (PANA) -- Anglican Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane opened the All- Africa Anglican Conference HIV/AIDS workshop in Boksburg, South Africa Monday by urging delegates to find an "African solution" to the pandemic. Full text...

Port Louis- Mauritius (PANA) -- A youth group, Mauritius Youth for Life, would this week launch a campaign to sensitise students on HIV/AIDS. Full text...