In celebration of its 20 years of community service, AIDS Foundation of Chicago has organized a series of public lectures featuring experts in the field of HIV/AIDS research and care. Recently Mark Kline, director of the Baylor International Pediatric AIDS Initiative ( BIPAI ) , was the keynote speaker at a Chicago Cultural Center event.
Kline began by presenting the World Health Organization's latest statistics on rates of HIV/AIDS. While in the U.S. the number of children newly diagnosed with the disease dropped to 59 in 2003, in developing countries 1,400 children die of AIDS daily. Earlier this year, Stephen Lewis, the United Nations Special Envoy for Africa called the current situation there 'doomsday for children.'
The main barriers to treatment in Africa and other poor regions, according to Kline, are a lack of infrastructure, a rate of per capita doctors that is at best 2% of what it is in developed countries, and the prohibitive cost of medication. He also cited a need for stronger political commitment and explained that with young patients, the complexity of the required treatment can make it extremely difficult to achieve lasting results.
Although it does not receive as much media attention, Europe also has its share of children living with AIDS. With half of the continent's pediatrics AIDS cases, Romania is especially affected. Kline said discarded medical practices like reusing disposable needles and giving whole blood transfusions to infants was still common there up until relatively recently. At the end of the 90s, with few resources at its disposal and an epidemic that was threatening a young generation, the country represented a considerable challenge to the medical community.
In 2001, after negotiations with the Municipal Hospital of Constanta and an immense amount of work revamping an abandoned building, Kline and his colleagues opened The Romanian-American Children's Center. Funded by Abbott Laboratories through their Step Forward Program and by the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, the modern clinic integrates cheerful rooms and play areas with an observation unit, examination rooms, classrooms, a pharmacy, and other facilities. Kline said it was very important for the inside of the center to respect and reflect the local culture. Efforts were made to create an environment that would put sick children at ease and reassure worried parents.
In the four years the center has been in operation, the hospitalization rate for children with AIDS has decreased by 90% and the death rate went down from 16% to a mere 1%. Six local doctors and two dentists have been trained in pediatric AIDS care. Ten U.S. residents have gone to participate in short-term HIV/AIDS training. Seven collaborative clinical research projects are currently ongoing.
Such encouraging numbers have prompted the Houston-based BIPAI to look for other communities where this model could be replicated. In 2003, with a grant from Bristol-Myers Squibb's Secure the Future Program, a center was inaugurated in Botswana. Today, the African center has 46 full-time members of staff. More than 4,000 children have been tested for HIV, and more than 1,200 of them are getting Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy ( HAART ) .
BIPAI has also opened centers in Uganda and Mexico City. Others are under construction in Lesotho, Swaziland, and Malawi.
See www.bayloraids.org/