CDC to Open HIV/AIDS Office in Guyana; First of Two Officials to Arrive This Week
The CDC this month in Guyana will open an office to help combat HIV/AIDS in the Caribbean region, and the first of two doctors assigned to the office will arrive this week, according to U.S. Ambassador to Guyana Ronald Goddard, the AP/Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel reports (AP/Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel, 9/10). Goddard said that one of the doctors, who will work in conjunction with Guyana's national health ministry, is an epidemiologist, but he was unsure of the specialty of the second official. The opening of the office fulfills a pledge made in April by HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson after meeting with Caribbean health officials to discuss the region's rising HIV infection rate (Wilkinson, Associated Press, 9/9). At that time, Thompson said, "We have as much to learn from this partnership as you do from us," adding that the demographic profiles of HIV infection in the Caribbean "frequently mirror" those of the United States (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 4/22). The Caribbean is the second-worst affected region in the world behind sub-Saharan Africa. Guyana is now the third nation in the region, along with Haiti and Trinidad, to have a CDC office (Agence France-Presse, 9/10).
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