AIDS is an appalling problem for sub-Saharan Africa and any glimmer of hope that something can be done is extremely welcome. Alan Stone, an eminent consultant to the British charity International Family Health, provided such a glimmer recently (快猫短视频, 8 February, p 42). Microbicides, he says, can be used to create vaginal medications that help prevent HIV transmission during sex. I asked Clare Short, the Secretary of State for International Development, if her department has a policy to encourage the use of microbicides in developing countries.
Short replied enthusiastically that Stone has made outstanding contributions to women鈥檚 health and HIV prevention, and that her department is committed to the development of microbicides. Last year, it announced a 拢16 million package of support for the Medical Research Council鈥檚 Microbicides Development Programme. Short鈥檚 department also supports the recently launched International Partnership for Microbicides 鈥� a public-private partnership designed to accelerate the development of microbicides and their availability.
A better range of products is needed to help women to protect themselves from HIV, she said, and an effective microbicide would be a vital addition to the armoury of products designed to prevent HIV transmission. Several products are scheduled to be tested clinically over the next year or so and many others are in the pipeline. A first-generation microbicide with limited efficacy may be available by 2007, said Short.
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This is a real glimmer of light in an otherwise dark situation. But it is horrible to contemplate how many lives will be lost to HIV between now and 2007.
FISHERY conservationists could soon be using robot submarines to check if stocks of particular fish species are as close to collapse as some fear. Daniel Doolittle and his colleagues at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science in Gloucester Point have developed an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) with sonar that can count and identify fish (快猫短视频, 15 February, p 16). At present, stock assessments can be affected by the quality of data from fishing ports and by the sparse nature of surveys from trawlers.
Elliot Morley, the fisheries minister, told me he is impressed by the improvements that AUVs might bring to fish counts, but that AUVs still have some way to go before they can be used in routine assessments. The system is not yet fully developed and while effective in a survey over short distances, fisheries scientists in the North Sea, say, need instruments with a very different resolution and AUVs that can travel farther.
Moreover, despite some progression, the problem of identifying species with acoustic images and neural networks remains. In Britain, the Marine Laboratory at Aberdeen and the Fisheries Laboratory at Lowestoft are watching these developments with interest. But although AUVs with sonar offer an exciting prospect, they are some way from practical application, said Morley.
Fair enough. But time is not on our side. Fish stocks in many parts of the world are at a dangerously low level. Why, if research into increasingly sophisticated weaponry can be expedited, can鈥檛 the wherewithal be found to save our fish stocks?
