On World AIDS Day (December 1st), a high-level delegation from the European Union and European & Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership (EDCTP), launched Phase 2 of the EDCTP, funding from which supports some of the research at CIDRI and the DTHC.
As part of the launch, Commissioner Carlos Moedas, EU Commissioner for Research, Science and Innovation, and his delegation were hosted by Professor Robert Wilkinson [Wellcome Trust Senior Fellow in Clinical Tropical Medicine, Director of the Clinical Infectious Diseases Research Initiative (CIDRI) and Professor in Infectious Diseases at Imperial College London], as well as Associate Professor Graeme Meintjes and members of the CIDRI team, at CIDRI’s clinical research site in Khayelitsha. This event was used as an opportunity to showcase the important work that CIDRI is doing to tackle HIV-associated TB.
The same delegation then visited the Desmond tutu HIV Foundation (DTHF) Youth Centre in Masiphumelele south of Cape Town, accompanied this time by the Minister of Science & Technology Dr Naledi Pandor. They were hosted by Professor Linda-Gail Bekker, Deputy Director of the DTHF and Desmond Tutu HIV Centre (research arm), and member of the IDM. DTHC’s previous EDCTP grant (2009-2012) had initiated a program in adolescent health and HIV prevention. The Youth Centre caters for youth aged 12 – 22 and offers a range of holistic development programmes, including a clinic that provides sexual and reproductive health services.
