"Even before the conference began, we learned about new breakthroughs that might help in the development of an HIV/AIDS vaccine. Researchers identified three antibodies that when combined provide protection against 99 percent of strands of the virus, and the primary antibody was found in a Black man.
A few days before the conference opened, President Obama released the first U.S. National HIV/AIDS Strategy. The strategy explicitly calls for focusing on the most at-risk populations including Black Americans, men who have sex with men and people living in the south and north east.
The first major story of the conference was about race, poverty and AIDS. To make sure that this story was characterized and contextualized in an accurate way, a delegation of Black journalists met with a representative of the CDC to provide a Black perspective on this study.
The third and most moving experience of this conference is the story about microbicides. This story is important for women, and it's particularly important for Black women across the Disapora and in Africa. The fact that this extremely elegant clinical trial and presentation were performed completely by South Africans exposes the lie and the stereotype that Africa can't deliver quality science."
My Thoughts:
If we are having a problems here in the US , you can only imagine that the difficulty is even more in Sub-Saharan Africa. It is hard to focus on the at risk population let alone everyone that is infected.
Yes Africa can deliver quality science and has always done so , what we lack is the resources to bring this science to the local population such that it will help reduce infection rate.
Waiting to hear some suggestions by end of Conference !
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