Routine or targeted HIV screening of Indonesian prisoners.

Purpose: Routine HIV screening of prisoners is generally recommended, but rarely implemented in low-resource settings. Targeted screening can be used as an alternative. Both strategies may provide an opportunity to start HIV treatment but no formal comparisons have been done of these two strategies.

EFFECT OF HIV PREVENTION AND TREATMENT PROGRAM ON HIV AND HCV TRANSMISSION AND HIV MORTALITY AT AN INDONESIAN NARCOTIC PRISON.

Validated data regarding HIV-transmission in prisons in developing countries is scarce. We examined sexual and injecting drug use behavior and HIV and HCV transmission in an Indonesian narcotic prison during the implementation of an HIV prevention and treatment program during 2004-2007 when the Banceuy Narcotic Prison in Indonesia conducted an HIV transmission prevention program to provide 1) HIV education, 2) voluntary HIV testing and counseling, 3) condom supply, 4) prevention of rape and sexual violence, 5) antiretroviral treatment for HIV-positive prisoners and 6) methadone maintenance treatment. During a first survey that was conducted between 2007 and 2009, new prisoners entered Banceuy Narcotics Prison were voluntary tested for HIV and HCV-infection after written informed consent was obtained.

Addressing public questioning and concerns about vaccination in South Africa: a guide for healthcare workers.

Vaccination is one of the most cost-effective and successful public health interventions in the history of mankind. Anecdotal evidence, the media, and South African-based anti-vaccination websites and blogs point to the existence of anti-vaccination lobbies in South Africa, although the part played by these lobbies in sub-optimal vaccination coverage is unknown at present. This article discusses some of the claims made by South African anti-vaccination groups, including some drawn from anti-vaccination lobbyists based in highly resourced countries.

An update after 16 years of hepatitis B vaccination in South Africa.

Hepatitis B (HB) virus (HBV) infection is highly endemic with at least 65 million chronic HB surface antigen (HBsAg) carriers in Africa, 25% of whom are expected to die from liver disease. Before the introduction of the HB vaccine, the prevalence of chronic carriage of HBV in black South Africans was 9.6%, with 76% having been previously exposed to HBV.

Hepatitis B vaccination coverage in healthcare workers in Gauteng Province, South Africa.

Hepatitis B (HB) virus (HBV) is highly endemic and HBV infection is a major public health problem in sub-Saharan Africa. Percutaneous/parenteral transmission is an important mode of spread of HBV in the healthcare setting, thus healthcare workers (HCWs) and their patients are at risk for acquiring HBV infections. This study was conducted on three HCW populations in Gauteng Province during 2009, in order to (1) determine HB vaccination coverage of HCWs, and (2) investigate demographic predictors of vaccination uptake.

Human immunodeficiency virus, hepatitis B and hepatitis C in an Indonesian prison: prevalence, risk factors and implications of HIV screening.

Objective: To determine the prevalence and behavioural correlates of HIV, HBV and HCV infections among Indonesian prisoners and to examine the impact of voluntary counselling and testing for all incoming prisoners on access to antiretroviral treatment (ART).

Methods: In a non-anonymous survey in an Indonesian prison for drug-related offences, all incoming prisoners and symptomatic resident prisoners were counselled and offered testing for HIV, hepatitis B and C.

Results: Screening was performed in 679 incoming prisoners, of whom 639 (94.

European survey of hepatitis B vaccination policies for healthcare workers.

Background: The risk of transmission of hepatitis B virus (HBV) to healthcare workers (HCWs) is well known. Under current European Union (EU) legislation, all employers should perform a risk assessment to identify those exposed to HBV and offer vaccination. Immunization should happen early after the start of their career to avoid infection and development of carrier status.

An estimation of the occupational risk of HBV, HCV and HIV infection among Indonesian health-care workers.

Aim: to estimate the occupational risk of HBV, HCV and HIV infections among Indonesian HCWs.

Methods: the model developed by WHO was used to calculate the risk. The input parameters were selected from the best available evidence in Indonesia through a literature review.

Reduced detection and levels of protective antibodies to hepatitis B vaccine in under 2-year-old HIV positive South African children at a paediatric outpatient clinic.

The study evaluated and compared the prevalence of anti-HBs and exposure to hepatitis B virus (HBV) in vaccinated South African babies aged between 5 and 24 months from the Expanded Programme on Immunisation clinic [EPI group] and paediatric outpatient clinic [OPD group], and results were stratified by HIV status. A total of 303 (243 EPI group and 60 OPD group) babies were studied. All sera were tested for anti-HBs, HBsAg and anti-HBc, while IgM anti-HBc and HBV DNA were only tested in samples positive for HBsAg and/or anti-HBc.

Chapter 30: HPV vaccines and screening in the prevention of cervical cancer; conclusions from a 2006 workshop of international experts.

The finding that cervical cancer only occurs in women infected with specific, "high-risk" types of the human papillomavirus (HPV) has led to the development of novel, non-cytology-based cervical cancer prevention strategies. We now have sensitive molecular methods for detecting HPV that dramatically improve our ability to detect high-grade cervical cancer precursor lesions. Perhaps more importantly, prophylactic HPV vaccines have been developed that are protective against cervical cancer precursors caused by HPV 16 and 18.

Chapter 29: Knowledge gaps and priorities for research on prevention of HPV infection and cervical cancer.

The recognition that human papillomavirus (HPV) infection is the necessary cause of cervical cancer brought new prevention paradigms in screening and HPV immunization. We now face many questions about how to implement an ambitious evidence-based agenda for cervical cancer prevention. Much is known about the epidemiology and natural history of HPV infection but several key variables remain to be elucidated.

Chapter 14: HPV vaccine introduction in industrialized countries.

Introduction of a vaccine requires the achievement of three initial milestones. These are licensure by a national control authority that determines the vaccine is safe and effective, development of recommendations for use by expert advisory bodies on immunization, and obtaining funding for vaccination. Once these milestones have been achieved, a successful vaccination program requires that a number of interlinked programmatic components be brought together in a coordinated fashion.

Contact lens-related corneal ulcers requiring hospitalization: a 7-year retrospective study in Belgium.

Purpose: To evaluate the clinical and epidemiological aspects of contact lens-related infectious corneal ulcers requiring hospitalization.

Methods: A retrospective analysis was performed on the files of patients hospitalized for contact lens-induced corneal ulcer in the eight Belgian university hospitals over a 7-year period (January 1997 to December 2003). Diagnoses for all hospitalized patients are obligatorily registered using the ICD-9 code.

Vaccine safety controversies and the future of vaccination programs.

In the years following the hepatitis B vaccination/multiple sclerosis controversy, a number of new issues regarding vaccine safety have been raised, in some cases leading to more debate and confusion. Against this background, an international group of experts was convened to review the current points of view concerning the use of thimerosal as a preservative and its potential risks; the suggested link between thimerosal-containing vaccines and acute lymphoblastic leukemia; the alleged association between aluminum-containing vaccines/macrophagic myofasciitis and general systemic complaints; a possible link between vaccination and autoimmune pathology; and a hypothetical link between measles-mumps-rubella vaccination and autism. At present, there are no data to conclude that childhood vaccines, and in particular hepatitis B vaccine, pose a serious health risk or justify a change in current immunization practice.

Long-term efficacy of hepatitis B vaccine, booster policy, and impact of hepatitis B virus mutants.

The long-term efficacy of hepatitis B vaccine, long-term effectiveness of hepatitis B immunisation programmes, immune memory induced by hepatitis B vaccine, current booster policies, and impact of hepatitis B virus mutants on immunisation programmes were reviewed at the Viral Hepatitis Prevention Board (VHPB) meeting in Sevilla, Spain, March 2004. The main focus was on universal vaccination programmes with data being presented from Italy, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Spain, Taiwan, Thailand, The Gambia, and USA (Alaska).

Maternal and congenital syphilis programmes: case studies in Bolivia, Kenya and South Africa.

Preventing congenital syphilis is not technically difficult, however operational difficulties limit the effectiveness of programmes in many settings. This paper reports on programmes in Bolivia, Kenya, and South Africa. All three countries have established antenatal syphilis control programmes.

Antimicrobial susceptibilities of Neisseria gonorrhoeae strains isolated in Java, Indonesia.

Background: Despite the rapid spread of antibiotic resistance in gonococci all over Southeast Asia, there is only limited surveillance for antibiotic susceptibility in Indonesia.

Goal: This study was undertaken to determine the frequency and diversity of antimicrobial resistance in gonococcal isolates from cohorts of female commercial sex workers in Bandung and Jakarta, Indonesia, and to characterize the Tet M plasmid among the tetracycline-resistant strains N gonorrhoeae.

Study Design: The antimicrobial susceptibility of 267 strains (85 strains from Bandung and 182 from Jakarta) to penicillin, spectinomycin, tetracycline, ciprofloxacin, cefotaxime, thiamphenicol, kanamycin, azithromycin, and trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole (TMP-SMZ) was determined by agar dilution.

The endemic treponematoses.

Treponemal diseases comprise venereal syphilis (Treponema pallidum subsp. pallidum) and the endemic (non-venereal) treponematoses, i.e.