Welcome to the first issue of 2010 Features, a free monthly features service launched by Panos' Global AIDS Programme that puts the spotlight on progress in tackling HIV and AIDS in countries around the world.

Panos 2010 Features aims to stimulate increased and improved media coverage of the progress and challenges facing country efforts on Universal Access, through news features, analyses and occasional opinion pieces that are produced to a high professional standard. Unlike other journalistic outputs, this service benefits from the services of not only professional journalists and editors, but also a number of experts on HIV and AIDS.

Working together they continue a tradition that has been the hallmark of previous editorial products of Panos — a network of independent institutes that have been working with the media over the past twenty years to raise debate on the key development challenges of our times.

Panos' 2010 Features will promote national coverage of progress on HIV and AIDS particularly from the views of the most marginalised people in countries in South and Southeast Asia, Central, Western, Southern and Eastern Africa, Europe, North America and the Caribbean. This will help to keep the commitments and targets of 'Universal Access' on the agenda, to promote action and accountability at the national level. The diversity and range of features from different countries will help build the sense of momentum around the Universal Access agenda internationally.

The features are free to reproduce and will highlight not only neglected or poorly understood aspects of HIV and AIDS but also the solutions that go unreported as countries around the world draw up their responses.

By providing a regular flow of in-depth and balanced stories written by professional journalists who know about their subject (and care), 2010 Features hopes to ensure that the HIV response is not reduced to arguments about provision of drugs alone.

To read the features, click on the links below:

UGANDA MULLS THE SEXUAL NEEDS OF THOSE BORN WITH HIV
By Hilary Bainemigisha
After notching up significant successes with checking the spread of HIV and AIDS, Uganda has been left pondering a problem spawned by its success. Many children who were born with HIV have survived into adulthood, thanks to better and accessible treatment. But they in turn want to raise families, preferring partners who are HIV-negative.
http://www.panosaids.org/2010/Left_read.asp?leftStoryId=10&leftSectionId=3

ZIMBABWE'S LOOMING CRISIS: HIV AND TB ON THE FARM
By Thulani Mpofu
Zimbabwe's farms have long been in the news for the government's controversial programme of settling black farmers on white-owned agricultural land. But risky sexual behaviour which can fuel the HIV epidemic is emerging as a major problem in the countryside. Death rates are high, and as one farm supervisor says, 'who will do the menial tasks?'
www.panosaids.org/2010/Left_read.asp?leftStoryId=12&leftSectionId=8

LACK OF FOOD WORSENS AIDS EPIDEMIC IN JAMAICA
By Andrea Downer
With so much focus in the fight against HIV and AIDS trained on providing easy access to medicines, one crucial aspect is often ignored: adequate, nutritious food for those living with HIV. It's a vicious cycle (lack of food can render medication useless, and hasten the onset of AIDS). In Jamaica this cycle is triggered by poverty.
www.panosaids.org/2010/Left_read.asp?leftStoryId=14&leftSectionId=12

URBAN WOMEN: THE HIDDEN FACE OF AIDS IN PAKISTAN
By Zofeen T. Ebrahim
More and more women in Asia are living with HIV after having unprotected sex with their HIV-positive husbands. These are women who are in a monogamous relationship but still contract the virus. Many of them are urban, educated and employed women. But when it comes to facing social prejudice, their situation is just as precarious as those of women in the villages.
www.panosaids.org/2010/Left_read.asp?leftStoryId=9&leftSectionId=1

AIDS DRUGS RESISTANCE THE NEW CHALLENGE IN INDIA
By T.K. Rajalakshmi
Those in charge of leading the battle against HIV and AIDS in India have just announced that they will roll out much-need 'second line' drugs, meant to treat those who have started showing resistance to 'first line' treatment. This is welcome, argue experts, but policymakers should also urgently look at problems plaguing the first line roll out.
www.panosaids.org/2010/Left_read.asp?leftStoryId=13&leftSectionId=9

2010 FEATURES: STORIES THAT TRACK HIV & AIDS
By Robin Vincent
An introduction to 2010 Features, and the reasons behind Panos' Global AIDS Programme's decision to launch an international media service.
www.panosaids.org/2010/Left_read.asp?leftStoryId=11&leftSectionId=6

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