EDITOR'OTE:One of the former "Lost Boys of Sudan,"John Dau, is a genocide survivor who arrived in New York as a refugee in 2001,after enduring a 14-year-long journey from his village in Duk County. Having witnessed how his family and community struggled without proper healthcare in Sudan, he started the John Dau Foundation in 2007 with the goal of building health clinics in his home country.

Now, another humanitarian crisis is unfolding in the Nuba Mountains, where Sudanese military forces are bombing the mountains where there are believed to be Nuban rebels, and villagers are fleeing to Yida, an overcrowded refugee camp in South Sudan.

New America Media reporter Zaineb Mohammed spoke with Dau about his foundation, his hopes for South Sudan, and his fear that the "Lost Boys" crisis is about to happen all over again.

Zaineb Mohammed: What is the mission of the John Dau Foundation?.
 

John Dau:The mission is simply to transform healthcare in South Sudan. We have built a medical clinic that is the first of its kind. Before,all of the mothers, including my mother, were giving birth in the villages - no medicine, no nurse, no doctor, no hospital, none existed before. The clinic opened in May 2007 and has treated 67,000 patients. About 7,000 mothers have given birth at the clinic.

The clinic is there to help people who cannot help themselves. We have so many success stories. Even as we speak, we have five mothers who are anemic, so we are giving them blood. If there were no clinic, where would these women go? They would just die, as their family members watch. Now we have a clinic to help them.

ZM: What inspired you to create the foundation?

JD: When I was young I used to get malaria, like every week. My mother and father would go out and find a local medicine-a plant called Thienget. My mother would take off the leaves and fruit and chop it into small pieces and put it in a bowl of water. The water would turn greenish, and my mother would take the residue out and have two or three people hold me down so that I could swallow that solution. It was horrible, very bad-the smell of it. I’m not sure if it helped me or not. I had to go through that all the time. You cannot blame our parents,that's what they thought would help us.

When my sister was giving birth the first time there was no clinic, no hospital, nobody to do the C-section, so the baby died inside of her and stayed there for a week. She had to travel from Duk County to a hospital in Bor, and when the doctor operated on her, he did something and now she can no longer give birth. My sister cannot have a child. I thought, I must do something to stop this-so that no mother would go through what my sister did; so that other children would not go through what I went through.

Health is paramount. You have to be healthy before you go to school,before you do any other things.

ZM: What kinds of services do you provide for patients?

JD: We are providing food for people, especially for those who are anemic or malnourished. We have built a nutrition center. Very malnourished children come, we admit them, keep them for a few weeks, and then we discharge them. That is also applied to the elderly.

There were about 326 cases of malaria last week. We go out in the community, we cut down the long grass, drain out stagnant water, and we are also asking other NGOs to help build mosquito nets so children will not suffer or die from malaria.

We take care of tuberculosis, and so many other diseases, and we treat them for free.

These diseases can be treated; these are diseases that in the developed world are like nothing. The treatable diseases are still killing people there in South Sudan because there’s no support.

ZM: What are your biggest challenges?

JD:Our budget right now is only $322,000 per year. It's very difficult;almost all of us in the U.S. are volunteers. I am in an office space donated to me by the United Way.

I thought I was going to build six more clinics of this kind. Building is simple, but supporting the clinic is a big task. I am not giving up on my mission to build more though.

ZM: Have the increased hostilities between South Sudan and Sudan affected the operations of your clinic?

JD: Duk County is far away. It's about 600 miles south of the border, so it is not affected.

The only thing threatening Duk County is the tribal hostilities, but that is coming to an end now. The government is taking an aggressive approach to stop the tribal killing.

ZM: How do you feel about Sudan and South Sudan’s future today, especially given the humanitarian crisis in the Nuba Mountains?

JD:To be honest, we were expecting it;we thought it would be the way it is today. We knew the north was losing 75% of the oil, so they would not go down without a fight. We were expecting that they would fight back. We were expecting the peace accords to not be met.

I think it is way better to have independence even if there is some fighting here and there.

ZM: Are you concerned the Lost Boys crisis will repeat itself? What could be done to prevent it?

JD: Omar Hassan al-Bashir [the president of Sudan] has been indicted by the International Criminal Court. He's like a wounded lion that knows his life is coming to an end. What do you think that lion will do? He will kill anything he can find. He will destroy anything he can find. The international community indicted this guy; they need to get him out there.

The international community is sitting on their hands not doing anything and watching.When we were very little boys and girls, we were allowed to be treated like dogs. People knew that we were in that situation, and if they had helped us, those who died, my brothers and sisters, would still be alive. The same thing is going to happen now. Children are being targeted.

Those boys are so innocent, they have nothing, and it’s not their fault that the fighting has been going on in Sudan. Get those boys out, put them in a safe place. They don’t need to go through what we went through. They can change themselves and their country later.

I came to the U.S. as a refugee.I left my home when I was only 12 years old. I also had to take care of other boys. Fifteen years later I came to the U.S. I worked hard, worked at McDonald’s, got my associates degree, got my bachelor’s degree, and now I am helping my people. I helped 7,000 mothers gave birth, and 7,000 children get vaccinated.

God spared my life for a reason, that reason was to help my people. If you help these young boys, they can help themselves and later help others.

Kenyans in the United States are more likely to report having diabetes or hypertension than other African immigrants, a study has found.

Over 10,000 cancer patients in Kenya spend Sh11.28billion for treatment in hospitals overseas.

Stela Akoth is a bright 16 year old girl who lives in Chemelil, a town in rural Kenya. She suffered severe burns when she was two years old from a kerosene lamp explosion and as a result, she is disabled and is excluded from many activities that her peers enjoy.

However, an amazing story is unfolding---After her concerned teacher contacted a local non-profit organization, a network of people came forward and now, she has an opportunity of a life time. She will be flown to Boston to receive surgery at the Shriners Hospital by a world-renown surgeon for child burn victims. Her medical expenses, living expenses, and air fare will all be provided by donors and charitable organizations like the Children's Burn Foundation.

A Boston host for Stela and her guardian in between Stela's surgeries is the only missing piece at this point. We have 3 prospective host families but would like to have a few more on our list in case things fall through for one reason or another.

Would you be able to host?

Stela and her guardian are due to arrive in early June. First, Stella will be seen by the surgeon to determine a plan. She will likely undergo a series of surgeries. Please be prepared to provide two beds and use of a bathroom and kitchen for a maximum of a couple of months. If you could provide meals, that would be helpful.

A TV station in Kenya covered Stela's story:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEgCajOODV4

Funds are being raised through the Children's Burn Foundation for Stela and other burn survivors:childburn.org/donate Please enter "Stela" in the comments section.

Contact Yasuko Voccio if you are interested in helping or have any questions atogasawara_yasuko@hotmail.comor 857-231-1254 (cell). Thank you for your interest. 

You can also contact the New England Kenyan Welfare Association officials for more information at:

978-809-5560, 781-953-2490

Thank you for your interest.

Team Stella
 

BOSTON----Dr. George Kiongera, the Kenyan man who several years ago became the first Kenyan known to hold a Doctorate Degree in Nursing Practice has achieved another rare feat; a research study he conducted recently on the first ever known treatment of older patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary disease (COPD) was accepted and published in the Journal of Gerontological Nursing--the world's leading resource for nursing care of older adults.

The feature, titled "inpatient pulmonary rehabilitation program in a long-term care facility" was featured from page 44 to 52 of the mostrecent issue (August 2015)of the nursing care journal that is published only once a month.

Currently, there is no any other Kenyan known to have been published in the world renowned journal.

Following the success of Dr. Kiongera's study findings and recommendations in treating patients stuck in long term care facilities due to COPD, a debilitating breathing problem with no previously known cure, and as a result accepted and featured nursing care journal, Dr. Kiongera's research now officially becomes a resource for healthcare providers and medical students all over the world dealing with COPD patients.

According to the renowned journal, the purpose of the study was to evaluate short-term outcomes of inpatient pulmonary rehabilitation programs (IPRs) for older adult with COPD. The IPR comprises medical management, exercise, nutrition, counseling and coping skills education programs among other interventions.

The journal concluded that after the IPR proposed by Dr. Kiongera's study was applied to older patients above 65 years, scores for health-related quality of life and subscales of symptoms, impact and activity showed a statistically significant improvement.

The August 2015 cover of the Journal of Gerontological Nursing featuring a new study (3rd item on featured articles list) by Dr. George Kiongera, is a Kenyan who practices medicine and is also a healthcare entrepreneur in Boston. AJABU AFRICAN NEWS PHOTO/H.MAINA

"Results showed that early IPR is an effective intervention for the management of symptoms of COPD in older adults recovering from a COPD exacerbation," the journal observed in an abstract.

According to the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, COPD is a debilitating, progressive breathing problem that causes irreversible damage to the lungs. It is ranked as the 3rd leading cause of death and 12th leading cause of morbidity in the USA. It is more prevalent than other major chronic diseases, such as Alzeihmer's disease and chronic renal failure, with more than 5% of the adult population in the USA being affected.

In 2010, the economic cost of COPD was estimated to be around $49.9billion with a further estimate of $29.9 billion per year used in direct treatment of patients. Another study in 2007 ranked COPD second to coronary heart disease as the reason for social security disability payments.

Dr. Kiongera's study, l therefore becomes the first known cure to manage and the treat the disease in the world, dramatically improving the quality of life for millions of older patients and potentially saving billions of dollars otherwise spent in efforts to manage the disease in long term care facilities.

It was conducted in conducted in conjunction with Dr. Crocker Houde, an associate Dean and Director of Division of Public Health, Director of Regional Consortium of Community--Engaged Gerontology Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Lowell.

"I feel much honored for my study having passed through the extremely rigorous review process by the Institutional Review Board (IRB) at Umass Lowell to meet the quality needed to be published in the Journal of Gerontological nursing. I am very happy to have made a significant contribution to the world of nursing that will help patients with COPD enjoy a much better lifestyle in the comforts of their homes instead of getting condemned to long term facilities struggling with the disease," Dr. Kiongera told Ajabu Africa News during an interview at this office in Lawrence where he is the President and CEO of Maestro-Connections Health Systems.(website)

According to Kiongera, his 9 pages of conclusive study was based on the content  from his PHD thesis completed in 2013, but had to be upgraded and accepted for international publication for it's "originality and ability to add something new to the subject matter" in question.

"This journal is the main and leading journal of gerontology in the world. The process of getting published there is very vigorous and leaves no chance for error. For me it was questions of either perish or publish-and so i decided to publish. I am very happy that it was published. Caregivers and research students all over the world can now quote findings from this study. I am very glad to have made a contribution to the world of academia as well," he added.

Dr. Kiongera said that his study lasted two months and involved 23 patients --12 male and 11 females aged between 46 to 95, all who were suffering from chronic end stage COPD and condemned to a life in long term care facilities in the US.

He said that before the study, the patients were so sick that they could hardly move any part of their bodies for the pain, and energy needed with their lungs not generating much oxygen.

"When a patient is suffering from this kind of COPD, even lifting an arm is a major task. These patients could hardly move or take a single step to anywhere. The slighttest movement brings tremendous pain in the lungs, so they prefer to stay in one place.However, after implementing our 8 week therapy program on them, which involved exercise and medication the patients improved dramatically in various outcome measures. They were then discharged from the long term facilities to continue with the therapy and recuperation at home," Kiongera told Ajabu Africa News.

The impressive results of the study will now see COPD patients suffering from a serious attach from the disease discharged from hospitals to long term care facilities where they would be put on Dr. Kiongera's 8 weeks IPR program, then discharged further to their homes where they can continue to enjoy a much improved and longer life together with their families.

Although the study was limited by the small sample number of the patients willing to take part, largely due to difficulty in recruitment attributed to fear of exercise among acute patients discharged from hospitals after a COPD attack, the study was nevertheless hailed as a train blazer in the still under researched field.

The study findings also suggested that there may have been a lack of training among nurses and healthcare providers in managing symptoms in the older age groups. However, with the new study, Gerontological nurses should be able to address the education and self care management issues associated with COPD attacks.

Dr. Kiongera added that the study can be replicated by healthcare providers across the African continent and the developing world where COPD prevalence studies are nonexistent but masses continue to suffer from COPD symptoms, largely thought to be caused by air pollution.

"African can borrow this to incorporate the integration of the IPR into the healthcare delivery systems, from the hospitals to step-down facilities to the patient's private home."

He thanked Dr. Houde for assisting him conduct the study and hoped that other people may find areas where they can improve on it for better outcomes for COPD patients.

The full study can be accessed online as published by the nursing journal at: http://www.healio.com/nursing/journals/jgn/2015-8-41-8/%7B63aa06e2-c7e5-4307-b2a7-59980332db1c%7D/inpatient-pulmonary-rehabilitation-program-in-a-long-term-care-facility-short-term-outcomes-and-patient-satisfaction

On the Net:
www.maestro-connectionshealth.com

Paris: Eating processed meats like hot dogs, sausages or bacon can lead to bowel cancer in humans and red meat is a likely cause of the disease, World Health Organisation (WHO) experts said.

The review by the WHO's International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), released on Monday, put processed meat in its group 1 list, which also includes tobacco and asbestos, for which there is "sufficient evidence" of cancer links.

Red meat was classified as probably carcinogenic in IARC's group 2A list, to which it has also added this year glyphosate, the active ingredient in many weedkillers.

Meat industry groups rejected the findings as simplistic, although some scientists said they may not add much to existing health recommendations to limit consumption of such meat.

The IARC was carrying out a formal review of meat for the first time and examined some 800 studies during a meeting of 22 health experts in France earlier this month.

"For an individual, the risk of developing colorectal (bowel) cancer because of their consumption of processed meat remains small, but this risk increases with the amount of meat consumed," Dr Kurt Straif of the IARC said in a statement.

Each 50 gram portion of processed meat eaten daily increases the risk of colorectal cancer by 18 percent, the agency estimated.

The classification for red meat - defined as all types of mammalian meat, including beef, lamb and pork - reflected ""limited evidence" that it causes cancer. The IARC found links mainly with bowel cancer, but it also observed associations with pancreatic and prostate cancer.

Inconclusive evidence of a link between processed meat and stomach cancer was also observed, it said.

The IARC does not compare the level of cancer risk associated with different substances in a given category, so does not suggest eating meat is as dangerous as smoking, for example.

But the bracketing of processed meat with products such as tobacco or arsenic irked industry groups, with the North American Meat Institute saying the IARC report "defies common sense".

Suppliers argue that meat provides essential protein, vitamins and minerals as part of a balanced diet.

"We've known for some time about the probable link between red and processed meat, and bowel cancer," Professor Tim Key of Oxford University said in a statement from charity Cancer Research UK.

"Eating a bacon bap every once in a while isn't going to do much harm - having a healthy diet is all about moderation."

The IARC, however, said such dietary advice often focused on heart disease and obesity.

It cited an estimate from the Global Burden of Disease Project -- an international consortium of more than 1,000 researchers -- that 34,000 cancer deaths per year worldwide are attributable to diets high in processed meat.

This compares with about 1 million cancer deaths per year globally due to tobacco smoking and 600,000 a year due to alcohol consumption, it said.

TEXAS

A Kenyan pastor in the United States has won a global award for her efforts to fight HIV/AIDS in Kenya.

Rev Anne Kiome-Gatobu, who lectures at Asbury Theological Seminary in North Carolina, received the United Methodist Global AIDS Leadership Awards on Monday in Portland, Oregon.

She hails from Meru where she founded an NGO, Focusing on Women and Children to Uplift Society (FOWCUS)-Kenya.

The organisation provides financial support to women living with HIV and educate children who have lost parents to the disease.

Rev Gitobu is also a member of the United Methodist Global AIDS Fund and was the lead organiser for the 2015 East Africa Methodist AIDS Summit held in Nairobi.

She is an ordained United Methodist elder and serves a co-pastor in Lincoln, Nebraska.

She has served as Dean of Asbury's School of Practical Theology for four years.

She specialises in family counselling and gender violence.

USA:AUnited States laboratory researcher was back at work after contracting the Zika virus by pricking herself with a needle during an experiment last month, broadcaster ABC News said on Thursday.

There is no vaccine or treatment for Zika, which is a close cousin of diseases such as dengue and chikungunya, and causes mild fever, rash and red eyes. An estimated 80 percent of those infected have no symptoms.

The unidentified researcher at the University of Pittsburgh pricked herself on May 23 and showed symptoms on June 1, returning to work five days later when she no longer had a fever, ABC News said, citing a statement from the school.

School officials were not immediately available for comment.

The incident was the fourth confirmed case of the Zika virus in Allegheny County, its health department said, without giving details of the accident.

"Despite this rare incident, there is still no current risk of contracting Zika from mosquitos in Allegheny County," department director Karen Hacker said in a statement.

U.S. health officials have concluded that Zika infections in pregnant women can cause microcephaly, a birth defect marked by small head size that can lead to severe developmental problems in babies.

The connection between Zika and microcephaly first came to light last fall in Brazil, which has now confirmed more than 1,400 cases of microcephaly that it considers to be related to Zika infections in the mothers.The World Health Organization has said there is strong scientific consensus that Zika can also cause Guillain--Barre, a rare neurological syndrome that causes temporary paralysis in adults.

To reduce the chance of virus transmission, the Pittsburgh researcher is using insect repellent to avoid mosquito bites, besides wearing garments with long sleeves and trousers, ABC News added.

Eating plenty of fruit and veg, the citizens of Chad have world's healthiest diet,while those in Armenia have the worst, according to new research comparing global eating habits.

The study revealed a worldwide rise in the consumption of healthy food, including fruit and vegetables, but this was overtaken by a worrying increase in the amount of junk food being eaten.

To make their findings, published in 'The Lancet Global Health' journal, researchers used national data from almost 90 per cent of the global population to analyse how people ate between 1990 and 2010.

They then assessed three dietary patterns. The first was based on ten healthy foods: fruits, vegetables, beans and legumes, nuts and seeds, whole grains, milk, total polyunsaturated fatty acids, fish, plant omega--3s, and dietary fibre.

The second was based on seven unhealthy foods: unprocessed red meats, processed meats, sugar--sweetened beverages, saturated fat, trans fat, dietary cholesterol, and sodium. The third was an overall assessment based on all 17 food groups.

Using this data, researchers scored countries between 0--100--with a higher number indicating a healthier diet.

The study revealed that high--income nations, such as the US, Canada, Western European nations, Australia and New Zealand, had better diets based on healthy items but substantially poorer diets when unhealthy food was considered.

And countries in sub--Saharan Africa and some Asian nations, including China and India, saw no improvement in their diets over the past two decades.

Meanwhile, low income nations, such as Chad and Mali, scored best for healthy foods.

Scoring lowest for healthy foods were European countries including Belgium and Hungary and republics of the former Soviet Union--including Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Kyrgyzstan.

When age and sex were assessed, researchers found that older people ate better than younger adults, and women ate better than men.

Researchers hope that their findings can help nations reduce the health and economic risks of poor diets.

Dr Fumiaki Imamura, of the University of Cambridge, who led the research, said that that improving diet has a "crucial role to play" in reducing the burden of non--communicable diseases, which will account for 75 per cent of all deaths by 2020.

The countries with the healthiest diets overall were:
1. Chad
2. Sierra Leone
3. Mali
4. Gambia
5.Uganda
6. Ghana
7. Ivory Coast
8. Senegal
9. Israel
10. Somalia

The countries with the least healthy diets overall were:

1. Armenia
2. Hungary
3. Belgium
4. Czech Rebublic
5. Kazakhstan
6. Belarus
7. Argentina
8. Turkmenistan
9. Mongolia
10. Slovakia

KAMPALA

Uganda lacks enough water for domestic, agricultural and industrial use to spur the country into a middle income status, State minister for Environment, Dr Mary Goretti Kitutu has said.

Dr Kitutu, an environmentalist formerly working with the National Environment Management Authority (Nema), said recent water quantity assessment by her ministry points to a 23 per cent coverage reduction, mainly due to wetland degradation and deforestation.

Consequently, the government dream of attaining a middle income status by 2020 which will require water supply for the proposed 23 new industrial parks, commercialised agriculture through irrigation, urbanisation among others will be in jeopardy, should wetlands and forests continue to disappear.

"We require 55billion cubic meters (for middle income status) but if we left things as they are, we will have 37billion cubic meters (by 2020)," Ms Gitutu, said at the GIZ International Water Stewardship Programme (IWaSP) in Kampala on Monday.

"40 per cent of our (Uganda) rainfall comes from wetlands and forests and 60 from external influence...protection of wetlands and forests is therefore very important in this Hakuna Mchezo agenda," Dr Gitutu added.

IWaSP running under the theme, 'how to make water stewardship work for water security' is a programme being implemented by GIZ on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and the UK Department for International Development (DFID).

It focuses on private sector engagement to combat common threats to water security and it is operational in other African countries like Zambia, Kenya, Tanzania, Ethiopia, and South Africa among others.

But the government will have to navigate the low manpower of 60 environment protection officers shared by National Forestry Authority (NFA), the Wetlands management department and Nema to be felt on the ground.

Uganda has a wetland cover of 4,500 square kilometres (1.9 per cent of Uganda's total area), according to a 2015 report by Uganda Bureau of Statistics (Ubos) that feed into lakes and rivers, including Lake Victoria, George, Edward, Albert, and Kyoga, along with the River Nile.

Although the country has enormous water sources; there are international treaties that rationalise water for riparian countries such as the Cooperative Framework Agreement on River Nile.

The country has also 556 forest reserves but 493 are encroached on with the highest being the Sango Bay in western Uganda. Uganda loses 200,000 hectares of forest coverage annually due to among other factors agriculture, infrastructure development, industrialisation and urbanization, according to the UN Food and Agriculture latest report.

Ms Petra Kochendorfer the Charge d'affaires at the German embassy at the same function said Uganda, like other countries is increasingly facing water challenges due to pollution, poor management and infrastructure access and climate change that needs to be tackled urgently.

"Climate change has led these effects to become more severe and it is this changing climate that calls for collective and continuous effort by all those who face water security risks," Ms Kochendorfer, said.

A coalition of medical organizations representing over half of American physicians launched a campaign yesterday to alert policymakers and the public to the dangers climate change presents to public health.

"Doctors in every part of our country see that climate change is making Americans sicker," says Dr. Mona Sarfaty in a statement.

Safarty is director of a new coalition of doctors, called the Medical Society Consortium on Climate & Health, and a professor at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. "Physicians," she says, are on the frontlines and see the impacts in exam rooms. What's worse is that the harms are felt most by children, the elderly, Americans with low-income or chronic illnesses, and people in communities of color."

The Consortium on Climate and Health's newreport,which is based on peer-reviewed reports, outlines the myriad ways climate is already worsening health, including causing asthma and other respiratory diseases.

The increased spread of insect-borne diseases such as the Zika virus and Lyme disease more commonly found in the tropics is another risk, the report says.

Seven in 10 Americans believe that climate change in happening, according to the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication. But just over a half of Americans believe that climate change is already harming not only public health but others areas as well. This is where physicians can play a role, says Dr. Aparna Bole, a pediatrician at University Hospital of Cleveland, Ohio.

"There is great consensus in scientific, public health and medical literature that acting on climate change is one of the greatest, if not the greatest, public health opportunities of our time," Dr. Bole says. "As a pediatrician I am interested in safeguarding the health of all children. In order to that, safeguarding a healthy environment is critical."

Children are among the most vulnerable to the health impacts of climate change, she says, partly because their respiratory rate is faster than that of adults, making them susceptible to poor air quality. Increased risks for infectious disease and extreme weather can be even more damaging when they happen in the critical developmental years.

"The WHO (World Health Organization) estimates that 80 percent of the health burdens of climate change will fall on children under [age] five," Dr. Bole says.

Asthma tops the list of climate health woes in many communities already suffering in disproportionate rates, such as in Cleveland where one in every five African American child has asthma. Many of these children are Dr. Bole's patients, and in caring for them she says she is already observing the impacts of climate change: increased heat, a longer allergy season, and worsening air quality. High rates of poverty are an additional burden on these kids' health, she says. 

Trump administration dismissive of climate dangers

The new administration has angered environmental and health groups with its proposed slashing of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) budget. The new EPA administrator, Scott Pruitt, has claimed that there is "tremendous disagreement" on whether human behavior has any links to climate change.

The administration has also announced it will significantly roll back the Obama administration's strict regulations on vehicle tailpipe pollution. Cars and trucks account for about one-fifth of the U.S. global warming emissions.

Last week, Mustafa Ali, the head of the environmental justice program at the EPA, resigned, saying that the new leaders have not given "any indication that they are focused or interested in helping" vulnerable communities, when those should be the agency's top priority.

That is a view Dr. Bole would concur with: "Children living in poverty are disproportionately impacted by environmental health hazards, and climate change is no different," she says.

Spring arrived several weeks early in much of the eastern United State this year, and last month was the second hottest on record. An early spring brings the onset of the allergy season, and can also mean the arrival of disease carrying ticks and mosquitos.

"Doctors like myself today are seeing conditions appear outside their typical location and season," says Dr. Samantha Ahdoot, a pediatrician in Alexandria, Va. Ahdoot recalls patients who have had to start their allergy medications much earlier and miss school because of severe reactions.

Doctors have "obligation" to speak up

The nation's family doctors, obstetricians and allergists may be well positioned to be the public's best resource on staying safe from climate impacts. A 2014 Yale national survey found that Americans see their primary care physician as their most trusted source of information on this topic, over organizations like the Center for Disease Control and the World Health Organization.

Molly Rauch is policy director for Moms Clean Air Force, a national organization that advocates for combating climate change and air pollution. She says doctors need to give parents like her the whole picture of how climate is connected to their child's health.

"Asthma is an epidemic in this country," says Rauch. "If air pollution makes asthma worse, [parents] want to know about it. And if climate change makes air pollution worse, we actually really need to know about it in order to take care of our children."

The new Consortium, which includes the American Academy of Pediatrics, American Academy of Family Physicians, and the American Geriatrics Society, among others, will deliver their new report to members of Congress, the Trump administration, and CEOs of Fortune 500 Companies to push for transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy.

"We have a moral obligation to act on their behalf," says Dr. Ahdoot, a member of the Consortium. "Given our current understanding today, failure to take prompt substantive action to reduce emissions would be an unprecedented injustice to every current and future child."

BOSTON--By leading a team that discovered Victrelis, the first ever effective Hepatitis C treatment drug , in addition to being the first African ever to be granted over 100 patents in the USA, Kenyan born Dr. George Njoroge has continued to be a trail blazer in the bio chemistry arena.

He has therefore become a great role model for many Kenyans and Africans everywhere who now see living proof that they have what it takes to be competitive on the global arena and rise to the top.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)Hepatitis C kills more Americans every year more than any other infection diseases, with about 19,659 deaths reported in 2014 alone, mainly attributed to low levels of diagnosis and treatment as most patients do not even know they are suffering.

In addition, about 3.5 million Americans are currently living with the disease, with nearly half of them unaware since hepatitis C has no obvious symptoms.

The numbers of deaths and those living with the disease are much higher if the entire world population is taken into account.

The CDC therefore recommends a onetime testing for everyone born from 1945 to 1965, and regular testing for others at high risk.

Once diagnosed, however, patients can now take advantage of new and highly effective treatments that can cure most of the related infections within two to three months, thanks to Dr. Njoroge's discovery.

In a newly released Diaspora Maters video interview with Ajabu Media shot back in 2014, two years after the drug was introduced into the US market, Dr. Njoroge describes the ups and downs he and a team of other researchers he led went through until the hit the only 1 molecule out of 5,000 failed ones that led to the life saving discovery.

The interview if the first to come in the Diaspora Matters Live program slated to premier on Ajabu Africa News several years ago vovering a wide range of community issues affecting the African immigrant community in Boston and elsewhere in USA but put on hold due to unavoidable circumstances.

WATCH VIDEO BELOW

Sierra Washington was stunned when, as a reproductive specialist in Sub-Saharan Africa, she first saw a patient who had undergone female genital cutting. Washington worked in Zambia, Cameroon, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania, countries where about one quarter of women had undergone female genital cutting.

Cutting ranges from clipping off the clitoris to what's called infibulation -- slashing the outer labia and stitching them together so that they heal across the vaginal entry, often closing the path for urinating and simply leaving a small opening to the entire region. The procedure, a cultural practice intended to prevent women from having extramarital sex, is most often performed on girls sometime between infancy and adolescence.

Today, Washington works with the Family Health Centers of San Diego treating refugees as part of the Duyna Women's Health Collaborative. That's where she recently treated a woman whose labia had been sewn together years before. After childbirth, the patient was faced with a choice --did she want her labia sewn together again? "I asked her what she wanted to do," Washington recalled, "and she turned to her husband for the answer."

Such patients are why the Family Health Centers, led by Kristin Brownell, sought and recently won a grant of nearly $1 million from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in July 2016. They plan to develop a program to turn San Diego's large African community away from female genital cutting (FGC) while developing culturally competent medical care for women who have been cut.

San Diego and particularly the City Heights neighborhood are home to as many as 30,000 Somalis--though reliable numbers are hard to come by--and thousands more people from Eritrea and the Sudan, where cutting is also practiced.

A United Nations Children's Fund report released in 2013 estimates that, worldwide, more than 125 million girls and women have experienced some form of cutting. In Somalia, Eritrea and the Sudan, 95 percent or more of the women and girls have been cut.

FGC appears to have migrated with those families, many of whom came to the U.S. as refugees fleeing from terrible, violent conflicts. Just two weeks ago, a doctor in Michigan became the first U.S. FGC practitioner to be arrested, allegedly for cutting girls as young as seven. A second Michigan doctor was arrested and charged Friday.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that 513,000 girls and women are at risk of being cut nationally, including about 8,000 girls under 18 in San Diego.

FGC is recognized by U.S. immigration officials as a valid reason to seek asylum in the U.S., according to immigration attorney Elizabeth Lopez. It is also recognized as violence against women and as torture.

Cutting results in lifelong health problems. "We see frequent urinary tract infections, a range of problems with menstruation and difficulty getting pregnant. Natural childbirth is extremely difficult and can result in tremendous damage," Brownell explains. Scarring from primitive procedures brings additional problems, including the necessity for Caesarian section delivery of infants or extremely difficult post-birth episiotomies, both triggered by keloid scars that bring a lifetime of pain and discomfort.

Yet, Brownell says, "Our doctors weren't trained to deal with this -- either medically or culturally."

So Brownell sought out partners in the community, including the Nile Sisters, a nonprofit well-known in the community for its economic empowerment and self-sufficiency efforts with African women in City Heights. Many of its staff are refugees or the first generation of U.S.-born children of African refugees

"Our goal is to create a pipeline of support, outreach and education," explains Rebecca Paida, a program manager for the Nile Sisters. "We know it is very difficult for a woman to go up against social norms."

To begin the conversation with the communities where girls are at risk, both doctors and social service providers must first find a neutral way of describing the practice.

Khalwa Suleiman-Qafiti, a primary care doctor who practices in Family Health Clinics, says that describing the culturally sanctioned procedure in terms of mutilation and violence makes it harder for patients to trust their medical providers.

"I like to call this female circumcision because it is respectful to the culture," Suleiman-Qafiti says. "It is done as a rite of passage; it's done out of love. It was not done with the idea of hurting these girls -- as difficult as that is to understand. When you describe it in such negative terms, the result is shame."

Most refugees already know that FGC is illegal because the agencies helping them settle into life here tell them as part of the acculturation process. Condemning the practice simply drives the at-risk girls and their families into secrecy, advocates say, which is why changing minds about FGC is a much more effective method of ending the practice, particularly when it is possible to simply circumvent the illegality of the procedure in the United States.

There is, for instance, a widely-recognized practice of 'vacation cutting' -- where girls sent to visit family in the old country are being cut with or without their parents' blessing. "We have seen the results of vacation cutting," says Paida. "The girls' teachers notice changes in their behavior and their health when they come back from visiting family."

The grant collaborative is developing strategies to make it safe for women to talk about the practice, so they don't look for other methods of obtaining FGC for their daughters, Brownell says. One approach, she says, is "talking about male circumcision and how there aren't valid medical reasons to have it done. Then people started opening up and sharing their experiences."

At first, the Dunya women talked to immigrant women and girls alone, but they found that women won't make decisions about their daughters' health without their husbands, so they now find ways to include men in the conversation, Paida said. Often, men don't know how profoundly FGC affects their wives' health and how it could affect their daughters.

To help those who have already had the procedure, the health centers currently refer patients to surgeons-- including Washington--for reconstructions. They rely on Washington and sometimes on a San Francisco surgeon whose expertise comes from gender transition surgery.

"When the labia were sewn together, you can reconstruct them," Washington said. "When the clitoris has been removed, we haven't yet figured out a way to replace the clitoris."

Thisstoryoriginally ran in the California Health Report,a statewide nonprofit news service that covers health and health policy.

A UK patient's HIV has become "undetectable" following a stem cell transplant - in only the second case of its kind, doctor’s report.

The London patient, who was being treated for cancer, has now been in remission from HIV for 18 months and is no longer taking HIV drugs.

The researchers say it's too early to say the patient is "cured" of HIV.

Experts say the approach is not practical for treating most people with HIV but may one day help find a cure.

The male London patient, who has not been named, was diagnosed with HIV in 2003 and advanced Hodgkin's lymphoma in 2012.

He had chemotherapy to treat the Hodgkin's cancer and, in addition, stem cells were implanted into the patient from a donor resistant to HIV, leading to both his cancer and HIV going into remission.

Researchers from University College London, Imperial College London, Cambridge and Oxford Universities were all involved in the case.

This is the second time a patient treated this way has ended up in remission from HIV.

Ten years ago, another patient in Berlin received a bone-marrow transplant from a donor with natural immunity to the virus.

Timothy Brown, said to be the first person to "beat" HIV/Aids, was given two transplants and total body irradiation (radiotherapy) for leukemia - a much more aggressive treatment.

"By achieving remission in a second patient using a similar approach, we have shown that the Berlin patient was not an anomaly and that it really was the treatment approaches that eliminated HIV in these two people," said lead study author Prof Ravindra Gupta, from UCL.

Prof Eduardo Olavarria, also involved in the research, from Imperial College London, said the success of stem cell transplantation offered hope that new strategies can be developed to tackle the virus.

But he added: "The treatment is not appropriate as a standard HIV treatment because of the toxicity of chemotherapy, which in this case was required to treat the lymphoma."

The first in class drug approved by the FDA for treatment of Hepatitis C in 2011 that was discovered by a team of US based scientists led by Kenya's Dr. George Njoroge has shown strong signs as a potentially effective treatment for the virus that causes Covid-19 disease currently ravaging the world.

The exciting news came from Dr. Njoroge himself during an interview with TV47 based in Nairobi Kenya where the scientist recently relocated after three decades of work in USA.

Njoroge said that laboratory tests conducted by a team of researchers from University of Arizona as well as another different team from Purdue University using Boceprevir (Victrellis ) that he discovered to treat Hep-C was also very effective at inhibiting the replication of Covid-19 cells.

"They looked at whether this drug can bind to the enzyme that is used by the virus to make new proteins replicate its nucleic generic material genetic material and uses those materials to form new viruses.The drug we have prevents this virus from making those new proteins.This means that if it cannot make proteins, it cannot make new viruses," said Dr. Njoroge.

He said that the mechanism by which the drug was designed to combat the Hep–C virus is working effectively to combat the Corona virus as it shows where the virus is, where it is working etc.This, according to the Kenyan scientist, was an exciting departure from the current three different methods treatments being studied by many scientists around the world to combat Covid-19 including vaccines, antibodies and small molecule repurposing using old drugs to treat a new disease.

"Now we can play around with that molecule, make it better and more importantly if we get resistance, we know where that resistance is coming from and we can modify the drug."

A screen grab of a 3D X-ray structure of COVID-19 main protease bound to the FDA approved drug boceprevir (Victrelis) released by Andwer Mesecar, Walther Professor of Structural Biology, Head of Department, and Deputy Director, Center for Cancer and Research, Purdue University, Indiana. (Click on image to play the X-ray video).

He added that although very promising, the current findings are at a very early stage but researchers are gearing to start studies with animal subjects before the final stage of randomized clinical trials with human subjects.

Dr. Njoroge clarified that during the randomized trials, researchers will administer the drug to two control groups in a population of Covid-19 patients where one group will be given the Victrellis drug and a different group getting a placebo drug (plain substance with no drug).

"Nobody knows what they are getting. At the end of the study, they will break the code and see from the data they get, whether the drug is effective or not. This is a double blind, randomized study," he assured.

However, researchers have to wait for the World Health Organization (WHO) to approve clinical trials as soon as the animal studies are complete in order to estimate the time it will take for the drug to come into the market if found effective in human beings.

He praised other scientists in the world who are seeking treatments for Covid-19 round the clock some of which have found promising results.

He also praised the efforts made by Kenya and African countries in combating Covid-19 with social distancing measures and testing as compared to other countries including the USA where media reports show many people downplaying the danger posed by Covid-19. Njoroge warned that viruses are small but deadly in their impact if not combated in time.

"We should not be complacent. This is a deadly disease. Viruses are deadly things; we cannot play around with them. We have to continue to do everything within our means to make sure we adhere to things we have been told about such as social distancing, washing out hands and staying at home".

Njoroge dismissed many models from the western world that had predicted a catastrophe in Africa from Covid-19 pandemic, saying that Africa has done much better than many western countries in managing the pandemic and thus saved a lot of lives.

He said quick and early efforts by Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta to sensitize the public against the dangers of the disease including shut down the country from all international flights. He also praised Kenya's health minister, Mutahi Kagwe for keeping Kenyan's updated with daily Corona virus reports which is very important.

Njoroge added that the Kenyan public has also played a very important role at keeping the corona virus cases low as compared to other parts of the world by their relative adherence to social distancing and hygiene measures.

Dr George Njoroge, a top Kenyan scientist who has worked in the US for 30 years. PHOTO | COURTESY

"Africa is a very interesting place because its climate is conducive to these bugs growing and they thought when this comes, Africa will be most affected unfortunately they have been proved wrong. This is something we should be happy about and I hope we will come out of it without too much damage".

He warned Africans from premature celebration of alleged discoveries by their own as reflected by the rumored "Madagascar wonder herb" that has been claimed to cure Covid-19 without any shred of scientific evidence.

"Celebrating is one thing, but we have to follow science. Discovery of medicine is very difficult and complex. If you hear someone saying that they have something that can cure, the question you have to ask is, where is the data--show me the data.This data can only come from double-blind, reliable clinical trials as I have just said above".

He said that even in western world, some people also believed in treatments that were not backed by reliable, scientific data, which posed a danger for patients everywhere. He cited the much-hyped effectiveness of Hydroxychroloquine at treating Covid-19 in the  USA, which only came from initial anecdotal data without conducting controlled studies.

"Once they conducted controlled, randomized studies with Hydroxychroloquine, they did not see the efficacy they had talked about. I know these medicines and herbal medicines could be very useful, but what we really need is to do thorough clinical trials to establish that these medicines are really working, it's not anecdotal," the scientist warned.

He urged Kenyans to be very careful and protect themselves against contracting Covid -19 since effective treatments and vaccines could take a long time. "We don't know whether we will get some or not. "It took us about 15 years to find the first oral drug for Hepatitis-C. I am not saying that Hep-C was more complicated than Covid-19. I am hopeful we will get a drug for Covid-19 sooner, but how sooner, nobody knows because we are researching the unknown".

He said that Kenyans and human beings all over the world should also prepare for the eventuality that an effective cure many not be found soon, hence can find others ways of living with and managing the Covid-19 virus just as they have lived with HIV-virus that has not effective cure as of yet, but has been managed though the use of other drugs.

"But if we can get a drug, fair enough. We will be blessed for that," he concluded.

In an interview with Ajabu Media, Njoroge added that although the Victrellis drug is no longer in active production due to an  influx of newer best in class  Hep-C drugs inspired by his ground breaking invention, it could come back to make a significant addition to new therapies to fight the Covid-19 virus in a big way