Severe road traffic injuries in Kenya, quality of care and access.

Background: Road traffic injuries (RTI) are on increase in developing countries. Health care facilities are poorly equipped to provide the needed services.

Objective: Determine access and quality of care for RTI casualties in Kenya.

Uganda's HIV prevention success: the role of sexual behavior change and the national response.

There has been considerable interest in understanding what may have led to Uganda's dramatic decline in HIV prevalence, one of the world's earliest and most compelling AIDS prevention successes. Survey and other data suggest that a decline in multi-partner sexual behavior is the behavioral change most likely associated with HIV decline. It appears that behavior change programs, particularly involving extensive promotion of "zero grazing" (faithfulness and partner reduction), largely developed by the Ugandan government and local NGOs including faith-based, women's, people-living-with-AIDS and other community-based groups, contributed to the early declines in casual/multiple sexual partnerships and HIV incidence and, along with other factors including condom use, to the subsequent sharp decline in HIV prevalence.

Public-private partnerships in blindness prevention: reaching beyond the eye.

The control of river blindness (onchocerciasis) has been one of the major public health achievements of recent decades. Initially, vector control was used to stop transmission of the parasite Onchocerca volvulus by blackflies (Simulium) but the introduction of ivermectin (Mectizan) as a means of morbidity control enabled new strategies of distribution to be developed based on community directed treatment. The donation of Mectizan by Merck & Co.

Linking disease control programmes in rural Africa: a pro-poor strategy to reach Abuja targets and millennium development goals.

The effectiveness of programmes to tackle malaria could be improved by linking them to initiatives to prevent other diseases

Partner reduction is crucial for balanced "ABC" approach to HIV prevention.

Behaviour change programmes to prevent HIV have mainly promoted condom use or abstinence, while partner reduction remains the neglected component of ABC

Equity dimensions of road traffic injuries in low- and middle-income countries.

Globally, poorer population groups bear a disproportionate burden of avoidable morbidity and mortality from road traffic injuries. The distribution of road traffic injuries is generally influenced by socioeconomic factors. Poor countries bear a disproportionate burden of injuries and fatalities, and within countries, poor people account for a disproportionate portion of the ill health due to road traffic injuries.

Characterization of trypanosome isolates from naturally infected horses on a farm in Kenya.

Following an outbreak of trypanosomosis in horses on a farm in Kenya, 18 trypanosome isolates were collected from the infected animals over a period of one and a half years and cryopreserved for characterization. The characterization was done on the basis of morphology using Giemsa-stained blood and buffy coat smears, infectivity to mice, recombinant DNA hybridization, and chromosome separation by orthogonal field alternation gel electrophoresis (OFAGE). Morphologically, all the trypanosome isolates were identified as belonging to the subgenus Nannomonas, and a total of 16 out of the 18 isolates grew in mice.

TrypTect CIATT--a card indirect agglutination trypanosomiasis test for diagnosis of Trypanosoma brucei gambiense and T. b. rhodesiense infections.

A simple and rapid test, the card indirect agglutination trypanosomiasis test (TrypTect CIATT) is described, for detecting circulating antigens in persons suffering from Trypanosoma brucei gambiense and T. b. rhodesiense infection by latex agglutination.

Sensitive and specific detection of Trypanosoma vivax using the polymerase chain reaction.

The nucleic acid probes that are currently in use detect and distinguish Trypanosoma vivax parasites according to their geographic origin. To eliminate the need for using multiple DNA probes, a study was conducted to evaluate the suitability of a tandemly reiterated sequence which encodes a T. vivax diagnostic antigen as a single probe for detection of this parasite.

Field evaluation of a dot-ELISA for the detection and differentiation of trypanosome species in infected tsetse flies (Glossina spp.).

A rapid, visually read, dot-ELISA developed for the detection and differentiation of trypanosome species in tsetse flies (Glossina spp.), was field tested alongside the standard fly dissection method on a range in south eastern Kenya. Of 104 G.

Differentiation between culture-derived insect stages of T. brucei, T. vivax, T. congolense and T. simiae using a monoclonal antibody-based dot-ELISA.

A sensitive and specific nitrocellulose (NC) membrane-based dot-ELISA, utilizing a panel of monoclonal antibodies (mAbs), was developed for differentiation between in vitro-derived procyclic forms of Trypanosoma brucei, T. congolense and T. simiae, and epimastigotes of T.

Production and characterization of a monoclonal antibody specific for Trypanosoma simiae.

Monoclonal antibodies (MoAb) were produced against invariant antigens of vector forms of Trypanosoma simiae. X63/AG8.653, NSI/1AG401 and Sp20Ag14 myeloma cells were fused with splenic lymphocytes from BALB/c mice that had been immunized with various preparations of T.

Immunological characterization and expression in Escherichia coli and baculovirus systems of a Trypanosoma vivax antigen detected in the blood of infected animals.

A monoclonal antibody (MAb)Tv27 employed in an antigen-detection enzyme immunosorbent assay (Ag-ELISA) for diagnosis of Trypanosoma vivax infection was shown to react with a T. vivax-specific protein of an approximate molecular weight of 10 kDa. This protein is diffusely distributed throughout the cytosol and nucleus of metacyclic forms, bloodstream forms, and procyclic-like elongated trypomastigotes, but is not detectable in epimastigotes of T.

Hydrogen peroxide destaining: a new method for removing non-specific stains in nitrocellulose membrane-based dot-ELISA for the detection of trypanosomes in tsetse flies (Glossina spp.).

Gut samples prepared from laboratory-reared tsetse flies and applied in dots onto nitrocellulose (NC) membrane were found to stain the membrane with differing coloration and intensity. The stains were, predominantly, either reddish to brown or blackish-brown to black and occasionally greenish to almost colourless, depending on the stage of digestion of the bloodmeal in the fly. NC membrane strips applied with tsetse gut samples from T.

Detection and differentiation between trypanosome species in experimentally infected tsetse flies (Glossina spp.) using dot-ELISA.

A modified NC membrane-based dot-ELISA was used to detect and differentiate between Trypanosoma brucei, T. congolense and T. simiae procyclics in the midguts of experimentally infected tsetse flies.

Sensitivity of antigen ELISA test for detecting Trypanosoma evansi antigen in horses in the subtropical area of Argentina.

The sensitivity of an antigen detection enzyme immunoassay (Ag-ELISA) based on a Trypanosoma brucei group-specific monoclonal antibody was evaluated to detect circulating Trypanosoma evansi antigen in horse sera. Three horses and 2 mules were experimentally infected with T. evansi.

Comparative sensitivity of antigen-detection enzyme immunosorbent assay and the microhaematocrit centrifugation technique in the diagnosis of Trypanosoma brucei infections in cattle.

Four Boran cattle were infected with Trypanosoma brucei using Glossina morsitans centralis and were left untreated throughout the experimental period of 18 months. During this period, sequential blood samples were collected and examined for the presence of antitrypanosome antibodies and their antigens. Using the buffy coat technique (BCT), trypanosomes were detected in 38 (16.

Trypanosoma brucei rhodesiense: use of an antigen detection enzyme immunoassay for evaluation of response to chemotherapy in infected vervet monkeys (Cercopithecus aethiops).

Thirty eight Trypanosoma brucei rhodesiense-infected vervet monkeys (Cercopithecus aethiops) in the late (meningoencephalitic) stage of disease, treated with various trypanocidal drugs, were monitored for a period of more than 600 days to assess the rate of clearance of trypanosome antigens from serum and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). There was a complete but gradual reduction in antigen titres, as assessed by ELISA, in animals treated intravenously with melarsoprol, the standard drug for the late stage disease. In 8 of the 9 monkeys treated with melarsoprol, the antigen titres, as assessed by optical density values, dropped by 50% within 252 days (mean value 68 days for antigens in CSF and 116 for serum) following treatment.

Trypanosoma brucei, T. congolense and T. vivax infections in horses on a farm in Kenya.

Equines are particularly susceptible to infection with Trypanosoma evansi and T. brucei, but rarely is natural T. congolense and T.

A species-specific antigen of Trypanosoma (Duttonella) vivax detectable in the course of infection is encoded by a differentially expressed tandemly reiterated gene.

A monoclonal antibody that is used as a Trypanosoma vivax species-specific diagnostic reagent on antigen-trapping enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay recognized an 8-kDa peptide on western blots. The 8-kDa species-specific antigen was isolated and employed in raising rabbit polyclonal antibodies, which were used in the immunoscreening of a T. vivax cDNA library in lambda gt11.