Water quality and access are already huge roadblocks for communities throughout West Africa without competition from investors in the Global North.  This makes the ‘water grab’ trend even more detrimental to African health and life. The most coveted water resource in the region is the Niger River which runs through four countries: Mali, Niger, Guinea and Nigeria. The Niger River sustains the lives of 100 million West Africans through drinking water and irrigation for the temperamental farmlands in the region. In the past couple of years foreign investors have flooded the area buying farmland and taking precious water resources for irrigation, leaving local communities without land, but also dwindling water supplies from their greatest water resource.

An example of this environmental, social, and health problem is Mali’s Office du Niger. This department is responsible for land deals with Western countries and corporations. Land deals fueling the great ‘water grab’ jumped 60% from 2009 to 2010 according to research performed by the London-based International Institute for Environment and Development.

Although there has been publicity and attention concerning the land contracts because of deals with corporations (Nestle) and countries (China and India), the repercussions of these land deals on local communities is absent from the discussion. It was only last week that the National Coordination of Farmer Organizations in Mali met for the International Peasants Conference to fight against the land grabs throughout the Niger River Valley.

Jamie Skinner and Lorenzo Cotula of the International Institute for Environment and Development sum up the situation well: “Allocating water to irrigated agriculture potentially affects a much broader range of users”. As if the global north and former colonial powers haven’t taken enough resources from African countries, now they’re depleting water resources in African countries to irrigate African land for their own ambitions. Unless governments, local organizations throughout West Africa and citizens of the world use their collective resources to stop the land and water grab, the fate of over 100 million West Africans is at stake.

(Photo Credit: see above)

Anti-HIV Gel May Take Years to Hit Market

Is 39% reduction enough? The dust has barely settled after the announcement of the first positive results from a microbicide trial, but scientists and policy makers are already asking themselves, ‘What’s next?’ “It’s very early, we still need to analyze all the data – and the study collected a lot of very good data – and understand it better before we get to the point of developing a product,” Mitchell Warren, head of the AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition (AVAC), said at the International AIDS Conference in Vienna. More:

• Hunting for a ‘Cure” for HIV
• A gel that puts HIV prevention in women’s hands
• Anti-HIV gel a “step forward” for HIV research

A Radical New AIDS Treatment Strategy

UNAIDS has launched a “simpler, more cost-effective approach to HIV treatment” The approach, dubbed “Treatment 2.0″, aims to drastically scale up testing and treatment using current best practices and future innovations in antiretroviral (ARV) drugs and diagnostics. UNAIDS estimates that successful implementation of Treatment 2.0 could avert 10 million deaths by 2025, and reduce new infections by one-third.

African Leaders Seek Solution to Maternal and Infant Mortality

At the 15th African Union (AU) Summit in Uganda leaders and health experts will meet to reassess key health goals. In 2000, African governments agreed to reduce by two-thirds the number of mothers and children who die annually from pregnancy-related complications and preventable childhood illnesses. Ten years later, little has been achieved on that noble commitment, as statistics show an African woman’s risk of dying in child birth is still one in 11 compared to a 1 in 7,300 risk among women in developed countries.

The Buck Stops with Hospital CEOs

In South Africa’s KwaZulu Natal Province, Dr Sibongiseni Dhlomo told the heads of the seven major hospitals that they will be held accountable for failing systems at their institutions. “If we want to turn around the tide of health outcomes that are terrible in this country, then you have to look at KwaZulu-Natal,” said Dhlomo. “We have the highest rates of TB, HIV and infant mortality and a large population.”

More than five million people receiving HIV treatment

WHO estimates that 1.2 million more people received HIV treatment in 2009 than in 2008. In addition HIV-related mortality can be reduced by 20% in the next five years if guidelines for early treatment are put into action.

New Mosquito’s Buzz Worse than its Bite

A malaria-proof mosquito has finally been developed and Kenya is expected to use it to eradicate the disease in seven years. Researchers at the University of Arizona, US, say they have made the perfect insect. The Ministry of Public Health and Sanitation, which starts a national data collection exercise on malaria indicators Saturday morning, says it will use a combination of tools, including bed nets, education, new innovations and medicines to meet the 2017 targets.

Vaccine Trialists Sue US Drugs Firm for Billions

Victims of the 1996 Pfizer meningitis trovan vaccine test which caused over 200 deaths and several others permanent disability have again sued the drugs manufacturing giant for a whopping sum of $384 billion.

You, too, Can Help Fight Niger’s Famine

In poverty-stricken Niger, it comes as no surprise that drought is pushing the most vulnerable people to the brink of hunger. Right? But then you hear a statistic like this one, with the power to shock even the most cynical: right now, fully half of the country’s 13.4 million inhabitants are facing famine.

More: Aid Caravan to the East

Dire Humanitarian Situation Continues to Grip Somalia

Withdrawn aid due to Al-Shabab’s bombings in Kampala have left the Somali people with even less international assistance. It is vital to ensure adequate funding to assist the 3.2 million people – or more than 40 per cent of the population – who rely on international aid, a senior United Nations aid official stressed this week.

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