21/10/2005

Pan-African anti-retroviral training course opens in Mozambique

The seventh Pan-African training course on the Drug Resource Enhancement against AIDS and Malnutrition (DREAM) program opened on Thursday in the southern city Matola of Mozambique.

The DREAM program is now providing anti-retroviral treatment to over 4,000 Mozambicans in 12 centers throughout the country.

After three years of implementation in Mozambique, DREAM has served as a model for the treatment of AIDS patients in Malawi, Tanzania, Kenya, and among others, and is likely to be adopted in several other African countries.

Addressing the opening ceremony of the course, Mozambican President Armando Guebuza called for a unity of efforts and resources to step up prevention and treatment of AIDS, and mitigation of the effects of the epidemic, not only in Mozambique, but across the continent.

Guebuza stressed the importance of training because of the lack of qualified human resources in this hard struggle.

The course is organized by the Italian NGO, the Sant'Egidio Community.

The Sant'Egidio Community is one of the NGOs cooperating with the Mozambican Health Ministry in administering antiretroviral drugs to AIDS patients, and its DREAM program claims a very high success rate - success in terms of keeping AIDS sufferers alive and leading normal lives.

In addition to Mozambicans, medical staff from Eritrea, Ethiopia, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo are attending the course.