Windhoek- Namibia (PANA) -- A meningitis outbreak in the Namibian capital and the surrounding areas has killed seven people in the last two months, the health ministry said Friday. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- Kenya's estimated 2. Full text...

Gaborone- Botswana (PANA) -- Botswana's health delivery system is seriously affected by shortage of medical staff at a time when it is burdened with diseases, health minister Joy Phumaphi has said. Full text...

Dakar- Senegal (PANA) -- A four-day conference opens in Paris Monday to discuss the impact of bovine spongiform encephalopathy or "mad cow disease" on human and animal health as well as in international trade. Full text...

Kinshasa- DR Congo (PANA) -- Participants at a symposium in Kinshasa have decried the scope of hospital-contracted infections in DR Congo. Full text...

Bissau- Guinea Bissau (PANA) -- Health authorities in Guinea- Bissau have seized some 140 kg of expired medicines from several pharmacies and peddlers in the black market. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- Kenya has announced that soon it would begin prosecuting persons who deliberately infected others with the HIV/AIDS. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- Kenya's public health minister, Sam Ongeri, said Thursday in Nairobi that a draft bill on the country's tobacco and tobacco products would soon be tabled in parliament. Full text...

Brazzaville- Congo (PANA) -- Some fifty experts are convening a workshop to examine the spread of sexually transmissible diseases (STD) and HIV/AIDS along the River Congo-Oubangui-Chari and to adopt means to combat them. Full text...

Dakar- Senegal (PANA) -- The WHO Wednesday expressed appreciation to the multinational pharmaceutical company, Pfizer, for its decision to offer fluconazole free of charge in least developed countries. Full text...

New York- US (PANA) -- US pharmaceutical giant, Pfizer Incorporated offered Wednesday to provide its anti-fungal drug, Diflucan, free of charge to HIV/AIDS patients in 50 least developed countries. Full text...

Ouagadougou- Burkina Faso (PANA) -- Traditional therapists from 12 countries attending the second international natural medicines exhibition, referred to as Sirena-Pharma-Expo 2001 in Ouagadougou, included Burkinabe Charles Hermann Kabore who presented an anti-malarial vaccine to the gathering. Full text...

Yaounde- Cameroon (PANA) -- Three medical doctors from Saudi Arabia are visiting Cameroon's remote northern Maroua hospital for ten days to do child surgery, treat bone ailments and practice general medicine. Full text...

Gaborone- Botswana (PANA) -- Botswana President Festus Mogae announced Tuesday that government would soon give free anti-retroviral treatment to all people living with HIV/AIDS in the country. Full text...

Lagos- Nigeria (PANA) -- An official of a Lagos-based NGO, the Society for Family Health (SFH) Tuesday debunked claims in certain circles in Nigeria that condoms do not protect users against HIV/AIDS. Full text...

Gaborone- Botswana (PANA) -- Botswana's main diamond mining company has announced that firms wishing to do business with it must support its health policy on combating the spread of HIV/AIDS. Full text...

Monrovia- Liberia (PANA) -- A survey has commenced in 30 randomly selected villages in western Liberia on the people's knowledge, attitude, practice and prevalence of the disease malaria, a medical charity official said here Tuesday. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- Kenyan authorities announced Tuesday that they were working on legislation that would allow the importation of anti-retroviral generic drugs. Full text...

Khartoum- Sudan (PANA) -- Sudan's Medical Council has suspended three doctors for malpractice that led to the death of three patients, the council said in a statement reported in the press Tuesday. Full text...

Windhoek- Namibia (PANA) -- The Mineworkers Union of Namibia (MUN) wants government to set up a National AIDS Fund to help fight the pandemic in the country. Full text...

Cotonou- Benin (PANA) -- Some 60 journalists from Benin's print and broadcast media begin an AIDS training Wednesday in Bohicon, 100-km from Cotonou. Full text...

Dar es Salaam- Tanzania (PANA) -- An Indian company, CIPL's Pharmaceuticals, plans to market in Tanzania, cheaper HIV/AIDS anti-retroviral drugs as the government grapples with the epidemic, the local press reported Tuesday. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- Bill and Melinda Foundation, an international Non-Governmental Organisation, has announced a 70 million-US-dollar grant to help eliminate meningitis in sub-Saharan Africa. Full text...

Abidjan- Cote d'Ivoire (PANA) -- Cote d'Ivoire requires some 12 billion CFA francs for the implementation of its 2001-2002 action plan for AIDS control, a government official said. Full text...

Port Louis- Mauritius (PANA) -- A report released Monday by the Mauritian Training and Productivity Ministry revealed that demands for foreign doctors and nurses are increasing in the island's clinics and private hospitals. Full text...

Ouagadougou- Burkina Faso (PANA) -- A soap called "Palusepso" is said by its Benin inventors to be capable of protecting the body from malaria, due to its very active components that act on the plasmodia. Full text...

Cape Town- South Africa (PANA) -- Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, the controversial ex-wife of Nelson Mandela, was in a stable condition Monday after being admitted to a Johannesburg clinic at the weekend. Full text...

Harare- Zimbabwe (PANA) -- Zimbabwe's Health Minister Timothy Stamps said Sunday the government was drawing up a tobacco consumption code to protect both smokers and non-smokers from the effects of smoking. Full text...

Maputo- Mozambique (PANA) -- Mozambican Health Minister Francisco Songane Friday said that generic anti-retroviral drugs will be available later this year in units of the Mozambican national health service. Full text...

Maputo- Mozambique (PANA) -- The Mozambican Health Ministry has pledged to introduce anti-retroviral drugs, which prolong the lives of people suffering from HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, into the national health service. Full text...

Gaborone- Botswana (PANA) - ­ Botswana is off to a controversial spraying exercise to rid its remote northern parts of the tsetse fly. Full text...

New York- UN (PANA) -- UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has announced the appointment of Stephen Lewis, a former Canadian ambassador and an advocate for Africa, as his Special Envoy for AIDS in Africa. Full text...

Addis Ababa- Ethiopia (PANA) -- Japan and UNICEF signed Friday an agreement under which a grant of 4. Full text...

Maputo- Mozambique (PANA) -- Twenty of every 100 pregnant women who attend ante-natal consultations in Mozambican health units are infected with HIV, the virus that causes the lethal disease AIDS, according to Martinho Djedje, spokesperson for the Co-ordinating Council of the Health Ministry, which has been meeting in Maputo since Monday. Full text...

Lagos- Nigeria (PANA) -- A Nigerian non-governmental organisation, Journalists Against AIDS on Wednesday launched its media resource centre and new Website in Lagos as part of efforts to sensitise the media and the public to the scourge. Full text...

Harare- Zimbabwe (PANA) -- Two international drug manufacturers have slashed the prices of AIDS medicines for Zimbabwe, pharmaceutical officials said Thursday. Full text...

Dakar- Senegal (PANA) -- In what sounds an ambitious partnership against Meningitis, the Seattle-based Programme for Appropriate Technology in Health (PATH) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) say they are joining forces to confront the disease in sub Saharan Africa. Full text...

Khartoum- Sudan (PANA) -- The government of Japan is to grant Sudan 2. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- The WHO says tobacco is increasingly becoming a major obstacle to the rights of children worldwide. Full text...

Cape Town- South Africa (PANA) -- South Africa's official opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) has unveiled a living AIDS policy discussion document in an attempt to implement a comprehensive anti-retroviral treatment programme in the country. Full text...

Maputo- Mozambique (PANA) -- Health units across Mozambique registered a more tan three million cases of malaria last year in a population of 17 million inhabitants. Full text...

Moroni- Comoros (PANA) -- The Comoros government the World Health Organisation (WHO) have launched a leprosy eradication programme in the country. Full text...

GABORONE- Botswana (PANA) -- Botswana health minister Joy Phumaphi Monday launched a national measles vaccination and Vitamin A supplementation campaign. Full text...

Lagos- Nigeria (PANA) -- Nigeria's public-sector doctors are set to mar the second anniversary of the country's return to civil rule Tuesday, with their threat to launch an indefinite strike to press their demand over better service conditions and unpaid salaries. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- US Secretary of State Colin Powell on Sunday in Nairobi called for an all-out war to contain the spread of HIV/AIDS, saying the disease has assumed the dimension of a crisis not only for Kenya but for Africa and the whole world. Full text...

Cape Town- South Africa (PANA) -- A total of 232 new cholera cases have been reported in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa since Wednesday afternoon. Full text...

Nairobi- Kenya (PANA) -- A new report of surveys and profile of youths in eleven African countries says that at least half of sexually experienced adolescents are ignorant of the ravages of the AIDS pandemic. Full text...

Ouagadougou- Burkina Faso (PANA) -- Panic has gripped students in high schools and college in Banfora 425 km west of Ouagadougou following the outbreak of a mysterious epidemic. Full text...

Maputo- Mozambique (PANA) -- Mozambique's deputy national director of health Avertino Barreto has called for a "more aggressive" approach to disseminating information about the incurable disease AIDS to the public. Full text...

Dakar- Senegal (PANA) -- In a joint effort to provide essential medicines at affordable prices, the World Health Organisation (WHO) and a Swiss pharmaceutical firm, Novartis, have agreed to provide developing countries with a new treatment for drug resistant malaria, the UN agency said Wednesday. Full text...