South Africa suffers the world’s largest HIV epidemic. Professor Caroline Kuo is taking a resilience-oriented approach to preventing adolescent HIV/STI infection and depression. Her international team will examine the efficacy of a family-based preventive intervention for adolescents and their caregivers.
In 2010, 30.2% of all pregnant women in South Africa who attended public sector health-care facilities were infected with HIV. Healthy Moms, Healthy Families is a longitudinal qualitative study by Professor Jennifer Pellowski that aims to develop and test a bio-behavioral intervention that capitalizes on the transition into motherhood to bolster self-care behaviors and increase HIV treatment adherence among pregnant and postpartum women in Cape Town, South Africa.
Professors Abigail Harrison and Caroline Kuo are researching the health needs of the first generation of adolescents living with HIV in South Africa as they transition to adulthood. Their study is focused on this high-priority population’s social and reproductive health needs, as well as the barriers and facilitators to adherence for anti-retroviral therapy, and the development of innovative interventions to promote a health-enabling environment.
Migration, Urbanization and Health in a Transition Setting is a study led by Professors Mark Lurie and Stephen McGarvey that examines the contemporary health transition in South Africa to better understand, at the individual level, how a complex pattern of migration and urbanization helps drive the health transition in these settings. The study devotes particular attention to how migration and urbanization help determine both risk factors for health conditions, as well as access to care and treatment.
There were 62,000 new HIV infections in Kenya in 2016. Professor Don Operario is examining the co-occurrence of HIV risk, mental health, and alcohol use among men who have sex with men in coastal Kenya, His goal is to develop interventions using mobile health approaches to improve access to health promotion counseling and support for this population.
Ghana has done well reacting to the HIV epidemic, increasing awareness and services, but many populations remain vulnerable. Professor Omar Galárraga is engaged in a collaborative project with the Komfo Anoyke Teaching Hospital and Adolescent HIV Clinic in Kumasi, Ghana to test the preliminary efficacy and feasibility of group-based conditional economic incentives to increase adherence to antiretroviral therapy among adolescents living with HIV.
