Just another nerd.
Africa Online reports that Nigeria is creating a special government commission to crack down on 419 scammers.
Of course you have to remember that Nigeria is one of the largest oil exporting countries in the world, but it’s government has not been able to solve the country’s long-running gasoline shortages. So don’t expect to see much of a decline in 419 scam spam e-mails.
Source:
NIGERIA TO TACKLE INTERNET FRAUD CRIMES. Africa Online, November 28, 2003.
The Mail and Guardian reports that earlier this week Lord’s Resistance Army troops murdered several children they had previously kidnapped in Uganda’s Lira district,
UgandaÂ’s LordÂ’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebels on Tuesday bludgeoned to death nine children they had earlier abducted as well as three others they found in a village in northern Uganda, army sources said.
This follows a week of incursions by the LRA in which more than 100 people were killed.
Source:
Children latest victims of LRA rebels. Mail and Guardian, November 24, 2003.
Members of Parliament from Lango, Uganda, urged the government to supply more rifles to pro-government militias fighting the Lord’s Resistance Army in Lango. The LRA recently released letters promising to undertake widespread killings in Lango.
Kampala newspaper The Monitor quoted Lango member of parliament Omara Atubo as saying,
Imagine 2,000 people being given only 800 guns to fight! We appeal to government to give us more guns to counter the bigger threat the rebels pose now. As a result, many [fighters] have abandoned [the war] because they will definitely not fight with their bare hands.
According to The Monitor, the government has agreed to give guns to the Amuka Group, which is fighting the LRA in Lango, as well as the Arrow Group which is fighting the rebels in the Teso region.
Source:
Lango MPs Ask for Guns. The Monitor (Kampala), November 28, 2003.
Voice of America reports that MPs representing the northern region of Uganda staged a walkout of parliament to protest the government’s inability to deal decisively with the Lord’s Resistance Army’s continuing violent incursions in that part of the country.
Lira district MP Margaret Ateng complained that after 16 years the Ugandan government still doesn’t seem to be able to stop the LRA from operating in northern Uganda,
But, to our surprise, no changes have come, changes meaning that there’s not been a stop to LRA incursions. Instead, it has worsened. We’ve seen that, whatever we’ve been mentioning, whatever we’ve been stating to be done, whatever advice we’ve given for things to improve has not been taken up.
Source:
Uganda parliament members protest continuing northern violence. Voice of America, November 24, 2003.
One of the long-standing arguments against the use of anti-retrovirals to treat the AIDS crisis in Africa goes like this: African countries like the health infrastructure to ensure that patients will consistently take anti-HIV drugs (which, of course, have a number of side effects). This will create a situation, the theory goes, where few patients take the full set of drugs and likely give rise to more virulent, drug-resistant forms of HIV.
But a survey of African patients in Botswana, Senegal, South Africa and Uganda found that, in fact, HIV patients in those countries were more likely to stick to their regimen of AIDS drugs than were Americans.
On average, the survey reported that AIDS patients in those four countries take about 90 percent of the prescribed drugs. That ranks favorably with American AIDS patients who, in similar surveys, reported taking about 70 percent of their anti-HIV drugs.
Interestingly, there is also evidence that African patients are more truthful in reporting their compliance with the anti-HIV regimen than American patients. According to the New York Times’ report of the survey results,
Moreover, doctors say, most African patients are zealous about their regimens. They are also more truthful when estimating their adherence, said Dr. David Bangsberg, a professor of medicine at the University of California in San Francisco who has studied compliance patterns here and abroad.
On average, he said, American patients tell their doctors that they are doing 20 percentage points better than they really are — that is, a patient who says he takes 90 percent of his pills will, when tested with unannounced home pill counts or electronic pill-bottle caps, turn out to be taking 70 percent.
A study of 29 Ugandan patients found that, on average, they estimated that they were taking 93 percent of pills and proved to be taking 91 percent.
There are a number of possible reason for the difference, including that in African nations a number of people in the AIDS patient’s extended family may be contributing to help pay for the relatively expensive drugs, and that AIDS patients in Africa have a more immediate experience with numerous fatalities from the disease given the relatively high death rate from AIDS in Africa compared to the United States.
Sources:
Africans Outdo Americans in Following AIDS Therapy. Donald G. McNeil Jr., New York Times, September 3, 2003.