Officials from the World Health Organisation have started a nationwide inspection of blood banks in Peru after four people were infected with HIV from blood transfusions at a public hospital.

Differences in sexual behaviours do not fully explain why the US HIV epidemic affects gay men so much more than straight men and women, claims research published ahead of print in the journal Sexually Transmitted Infections.

Three related papers published in the Sept. 1 edition of The Journal of Immunology provide key new insights into the complexity of HIV/AIDS.

By furthering scientists’ understanding of the molecular mechanisms that separate the minority of successful HIV antibodies from the majority of ineffective antibodies, the work may have implications for future attempts to design an HIV vaccine.

In a report that is among the first to describe the prevalence of HIV and Hepatitis B and C viruses in Afghanistan, a researcher from the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine voiced concerns that increasing injection drug use and accompanying high-risk behavior could lead to an HIV epidemic in Afghanistan.

Several Indian states have suspended a sex education program designed for school students by a government body fighting to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS. The program has stirred an emotional dispute, between those who say it will reduce the spread of HIV by promoting safer sex, and those who say it will ruin Indian culture by corrupting young minds.

Libya has called on other Arab countries to join Tripoli in condemning Bulgaria for pardoning six medical workers convicted in Libya of infecting hundreds of children with the HIV virus.

Health officials in Kyrgyzstan confirmed earlier reports Monday that 11 people, including nine children, had contracted HIV after being given contaminated blood during transfusions in the south of the Central Asian state.

Neither France nor the EU paid money for the release of five nurses and a Palestinian doctor sentenced to life in Libya on charges of contaminating children with the AIDS virus, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said.

Five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor arrived in Sofia today following their release by Tripoli. The medics, convicted by Libya of deliberately infecting children with HIV, were pardoned by Bulgaria’s President Georgi Parvanov upon arrival.

Discrimination and lack of medical support have led to alarming rise of new HIV infections among men who have sex with men in developing countries, a leading American AIDS research group said Tuesday.

The wife of French President Nicolas Sarkozy is in Libya Monday for a second time to negotiate the release of five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor sentenced to life in prison for allegedly contaminating children with AIDS. Libya`s top court last week commuted the death sentences against six to life imprisonment.