An exploration of the youth unemployment challenge within the Umgungundlovu District Municipality.

Masters Degree. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg.The continual rise in the youth unemployment rate has had a damaging impact on the socioeconomic stabilities of many nations across the world. In this regard, the ANC led government of South Africa grapples with high rates of youth unemployment as one of the most pressing challenges facing their administration. This is evident in recent labour report from Statistics South Africa (2019), which stated that the country has the highest youth unemployment rate (54.7 percent) of persons aged 15–24, compared to other nations. On this backdrop, this study explored the youth unemployment challenge within five local municipalities in uMgungundlovu District Municipality of KwaZulu Natal, which are: Msunduzi, uMshwathi, uMngeni, Mpofana and Mkhambathini. The objectives of the study were to understand the barriers preventing young people from finding employment within the District Municipality; evaluate the level of skills, experience and competencies of unemployed youths within the District Municipality; investigate the types of implemented programs geared towards addressing youth unemployment; understand partnership strategies available amongst stakeholders in ensuring that employment opportunities are availed to youths and; understand the lessons that can be learnt from the successes and failures of youth employment initiatives in the District Municipality. These objectives were achieved by adopting a qualitative methodological approach using non-probability purposive and snowballing sampling procedures to select a total sample size of thirty subjects from the target population consisting of five local municipalities mentioned above. A thematic content analysis of acquired data using NVivo software revealed that the barriers to youth employment are; lack of required skills and qualifications, labour market rigidities, lack of industries in rural communities, lack of career guidance, low budget allocation to rural municipalities, high population growth and poverty in rural communities and corruption within government departments. The research findings revealed that youth unemployment challenge can be addressed through a multipronged strategy which includes all relevant stakeholders

Early childhood education in differing contexts:The impact of the COVID-19 global health pandemic within four countries

The recent Covid‐19 global health pandemic has negatively affected the political and economic development of communities around the world. This article shares the lessons from our multi‐country project Safe, Inclusive Participative Pedagogy: Improving Early Childhood Education in Fragile Contexts (UKRI GCRF) on how children in communities in Brazil, Eswatini, South Africa, and Scotland have experienced the effects of the pandemic. This article benefits from having co‐authors from various countries, bringing their own located knowledge to considerations of children’s rights and early childhood education in the wake of the pandemic. The authors discuss different perspectives on children’s human rights within historical, social, and cultural contexts and, by doing so, will discuss how the global pandemic has placed a spotlight on the previous inequalities within early years education and how the disparity of those with capital (economic and social) have led to an even greater disproportion of children needing health and educational support

Contribution of PEPFAR-Supported HIV and TB Molecular Diagnostic Networks to COVID-19 Testing Preparedness in 16 Countries.

The US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) supports molecular HIV and tuberculosis diagnostic networks and information management systems in low- and middle-income countries. We describe how national programs leveraged these PEPFAR-supported laboratory resources for SARS-CoV-2 testing during the COVID-19 pandemic. We sent a spreadsheet template consisting of 46 indicators for assessing the use of PEPFAR-supported diagnostic networks for COVID-19 pandemic response activities during April 1, 2020, to March 31, 2021, to 27 PEPFAR-supported countries or regions. A total of 109 PEPFAR-supported centralized HIV viral load and early infant diagnosis laboratories and 138 decentralized HIV and TB sites reported performing SARS-CoV-2 testing in 16 countries. Together, these sites contributed to >3.4 million SARS-CoV-2 tests during the 1-year period. Our findings illustrate that PEPFAR-supported diagnostic networks provided a wide range of resources to respond to emergency COVID-19 diagnostic testing in 16 low- and middle-income countries

Epidemiologic Investigation of Intestinal Parasite Infection and Associated Risk Factors among Primary Schoolchildren in the Manzini and Lubombo Provinces, the Kingdom of Eswatini

Although the deworming program has been executed since 2000, the intestinal parasitic infection (IPI) rates among primary schoolchildren (PSC) in the two provinces of the Kingdom of Eswatini investigated in 2010 remained high, reaching 32.2%. In this study, we monitored the IPI status along with the associated risk factors for PSC in two provinces—Manzini and Lubombo. After consent from their parents/guardians, a total of 316 samples collected from PSC with grades 1 to 3 from four primary schools in Manzini and Lubombo were examined by the Merthiolate-Iodine-Formaldehyde (MIF) method. In addition, demographic characteristics and risk factors acquired by questionnaire surveys were included to be statistically analyzed. The overall prevalence was 40.5% (128/316), of which the infection rate in Manzini and Lubombo was 28.8% (19/66) and 58.3% (74/140), respectively. Pathogenic protozoa had the highest infection rate of 20.6% (65/316), including Entamoeba histolytica/dispar (8.5%, 27/316), Giardia duodenalis (14.6%, 46/316), and Blastocystis hominis (9.8%, 31/316). In terms of helminth infection, the infection rate was quite low, 1.6% only, and these five infected cases included four cases of Hymenolepis nana and one case of Enterobius vermicularis infection. Present study showed that 27.8% (88/316) of PSC were infected by more than one pathogenic parasite. Personal hygiene like washing hands before a meal has a significant protection effect (OR = 0.32, 95% CI = 0.14–0.75, p=0.009). Rain or well water and the type of water supply from which they drank also showed a considerable risk factor (OR = 2.44, 95% CI = 1.25–4.79, p=0.04). The IPI rate in PSC seems unlikely changed compared to that of the previous survey conducted in 2010, especially when the pathogenic protozoan infection rate remains high. Treatment of infected PSC with appropriate medication to reduce intestinal pathogenic protozoan infection should be seriously considered by Eswatini Health Authority

Field suitability and diagnostic accuracy of the Biocentric® open real-time PCR platform for plasma-based HIV viral load quantification in Swaziland

Abstract Background Viral load (VL) testing is being scaled up in resource-limited settings. However, not all commercially available VL testing methods have been evaluated under field conditions. This study is one of a few to evaluate the Biocentric platform for VL quantification in routine practice in Sub-Saharan Africa. Methods Venous blood specimens were obtained from patients eligible for VL testing at two health facilities in Swaziland from October 2016 to March 2017. Samples were centrifuged at two laboratories (LAB-1, LAB-2) to obtain paired plasma specimens for VL quantification with the national reference method and on the Biocentric platform. Agreement (correlation, Bland–Altman) and accuracy (sensitivity, specificity) indicators were calculated at the VL thresholds of 416 (2.62 log10) and 1000 (3.0 log10) copies/mL. Leftover samples from patients with discordant VL results were re-quantified and accuracy indicators recalculated. Logistic regression was used to compare laboratory performance. Results A total of 364 paired plasma samples (LAB-1: n = 198; LAB-2: n = 166) were successfully tested using both methods. The correlation was high (R = 0.82, p < 0.01), and the Bland–Altman analysis showed a minimal mean difference (− 0.03 log10 copies/mL; 95% CI: -1.15 to 1.08). At the clinical threshold level of 3.0 log10 copies/mL, the sensitivity was 88.6% (95% CI: 78.7 to 94.9) and the specificity was 98.3% (95% CI: 96.1 to 99.4). Sensitivity was higher in LAB-1 (100%; 95% CI: 71.5 to 100) than in LAB-2 (86.4%; 95% CI: 75.0 to 94.0). Most upward (n = 8, 2.2%) and downward (n = 11, 3.0%) misclassifications occurred at the 2.62 log threshold, with LAB-2 having a 16 (95% CI: 2.26 to 113.27; p = 0.006) times higher odds of downward misclassification. After retesting of discordant leftover samples (n = 17), overall sensitivity increased to 93.5% (95% CI: 85.5 to 97.9) and 97.1% (95% CI: 90.1 to 99.7) at the 2.62 and 3.0 thresholds, and specificity increased to 98.6% (95% CI: 96.5 to 99.6) and 99.0% (95% CI: 97.0 to 99.8) respectively. Conclusions The test characteristics of the Biocentric platform were overall comparable to the national reference method for VL quantification. One laboratory tended to misclassify VL results downwards, likely owing to unmet training needs and lack of previous hands-on practice

Predicted prevalence ratios of self-reporting high-risk sex relative to PLHIV On ART undetectable (≤50 copies/mL) for each of the 14 survey countries by sex.

Predicted prevalence ratios of self-reporting high-risk sex relative to PLHIV On ART undetectable (≤50 copies/mL) for each of the 14 survey countries by sex.</p

Forest plots showing the predicted prevalence ratios and 95% confidence intervals of self-reporting condomless casual partnership for each of the 14 survey countries by sex.

Forest plots showing the predicted prevalence ratios and 95% confidence intervals of self-reporting condomless casual partnership for each of the 14 survey countries by sex.</p

S10 Fig -

(A) Boxplots of the log10 viral load distribution and (B) Mean annual transmission rates and 95% confidence intervals for each PLHIV population sub-group estimated using the Hill function by sex. (DOCX)</p

Weighted proportion of PLHIV and estimated proportion of transmission attributed to PLHIV subgroup among (a) women and (b) men across 14 PHIA surveys.

Estimated using the country-specific prevalence ratio of HIV high-risk behaviour, proportion size, and transmission rate for each PLHIV subgroup.</p