Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Nov 30 2007 (IPS) – As the temperature drops and another cool season approaches, attention is turning to Vietnam s duck population, suspected to have become vulnerable to the deadly avian influenza (AI) virus.
The deaths of large numbers of free-range ducks through November appears to confirm the view that they are no more silent carriers of the H5N1 virus, as was thought to be the case after the current outbreak of AI began in the winter of 2003. In the Cao Bang province, in the northern mountains of the country, 60 ducks from a flock of 82, and 12 chickens from a flock of 17, died over a five-day period, this month.

Free range ducks didn t show signs of the virus unlike chickens, which were getting infected and dying, says Jeffery Gilb…

Interview with HIV/AIDS activist Gracia Violeta Ross Quiroga

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 11 2008 (IPS) – As the United Nations winds down a major two-day conference to take stock of the global response to the HIV/AIDS pandemic, the problem of persistent discrimination against people living with the virus has been high on the agenda.

Gracia Violeta Ross Quiroga Credit: The Fig Tree

This is somewhat ironic, civil society groups say, in light of the fact that HIV-positive delegates wishing to attend the meeting at U.N. headquarters in New York were themselves forced to apply f…

Farmers are in despair at the drought crisis in Southern Madagascar, where at least 1.14 million people are food insecure. Credit: Miriam Gathigah/IPS

BEKILY, Madagascar, Jun 14 2016 (IPS) – Havasoa Philomene did not have any maize when the harvesting season kicked off at the end of May since like many in the Greater South of Madagascar, she had already boiled and eaten all her seeds due to the ongoing drought.

Here, thousands of children are living on wild cactus fruits in spite of the severe constipation that they cause, but in the face of the most severe drought witnessed yet, Malagasy people have resorted to desperate measures just to survive.