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General Optical Council Highlights Importance Of Student Supervision, UK
The General Optical Council (GOC) is today reminding all optical businesses, students and supervisors to ensure their current arrangements for professional supervision of students meet the requirements outlined by the GOC, and examination or assessment bodies. This follows the recent Fitness to Practise (FTP) hearing involving Boots Opticians Ltd (a GOC-registered business); Trevor Burgess, a registered student dispensing optician; and Richard Simmons, a registered dispensing optician.

Diamyd(R) Phase III Study Approved For Younger Patients In The US
Diamyd Medical reported that the company has received approval from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to include children with type 1 diabetes from 10 years of age in the company"s Phase III study with the diabetes vaccine Diamyd(R).
News of the day
National HIV/AIDS Advocate, Physician Joel Weisman Dies In California
Joel Weisman, "one of the first physicians to detect the AIDS epidemic and who became a national advocate for AIDS research, treatment and prevention," died on Saturday at his home in Westwood, Calif., the Los Angeles Times reports. Weisman was 66. Weisman was a general practitioner in southern California when in 1980 he first saw three ill gay men with a set of mysterious symptoms. He later contributed to the June 5, 1981 CDC Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, which "signaled the official start of the epidemic that the federal agency later named acquired immunodeficiency syndrome," according to the Times. Weisman was the founding chair of AIDS Project Los Angeles in 1983, helped organize the first dedicated hospital AIDS unit in Southern California and was an original board member of amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research (Woo, 7/23).
Public Health

U.N. Agencies Increase Request For Foreign Donations To Zimbabwe

In the midst of Zimbabwe"s growing humanitarian crisis, U.N. agencies on Monday released a revised statement of appeal for foreign donations totaling $718 million for "food, clean water, AIDS medicines and other aid - up from an estimate of $550 million in November," the AP/Washington Post reports (Shaw, AP/Washington Post, 6/1). "Clearly, significant changes in the country"s political and socio-economic landscape have occurred since January 2009," Agostinho Zacarias, U.N. humanitarian coordinator for Zimbabwe, said Monday during the launch of the revised Consolidated Appeals Process (CAP) 2009 in the capital city of Harare, Zimbabwe. The CAP is a tool used for raising money for humanitarian efforts (IRIN, 6/1). Growing needs in the sectors of agriculture, health, education, food aid and safe water led to the boosted funding request (Banya, Reuters, 6/1). Basic social services in the country have suffered, worsened still by "a cholera outbreak that has killed more than 4,200 people since August and increased hunger," the AP/Washington Post writes (AP/Washington Post, 6/1). "It is uncertain whether the revised CAP will translate into more funding; at $246 million the initial appeal was still only 45 percent funded by the end of May," half of which was carried over from 2008, IRIN writes, adding, "Actual funding to the CAP was therefore only 17 percent, compared to 25 percent at the same time a year ago" (IRIN, 6/1). An additional $8 billion appeal by Zimbabwe"s government to help with economic recovery in the country - "separate from humanitarian aid" - has so far pulled in $400 million "pledged in credit lines since April" (AP/Washington Post, 6/1). The U.N. estimates "six million Zimbabweans have limited or no access to clean water, more than half the population may require food aid this year," and "44,000 children under five years need treatment for acute malnutrition." "Consequences of a protracted economic meltdown and lack of agricultural inputs for the 2008/9 agriculture season, compounded by the collapse of critical social services, continue to place the country in a situation of structural emergency," the U.N. said (Reuters, 6/1). Recent Deaths of Prisoners Suspected To Be Caused By Cholera Outbreak In related news, the Zimbabwe Times examines the recent report that at least ten inmates at a prison in Zimbabwe have died and others were hospitalized over the weekend following a cholera outbreak at the institution. A police spokesperson confirmed the inmate deaths, but did not confirm the cause of death to be cholera (Chikari, Zimbabwe Times, 6/2). This information was reprinted from globalhealth.kff.org with kind permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Global Health Policy Report, search the archives and sign up for email delivery at globalhealth.kff.org. © Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.


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