LEADING RESEARCH CENTRES
LEADING RESEARCH CENTRES
Africa Centre for Health and Population Studies
T
he Africa Centre for Health and Population Studies was established in 1997 as an initiative of the former University of Natal and University of Durban-Westville in association with the South African Medical Research Council with funding provided by the Wellcome Trust, a medical charity in the United Kingdom. The Centre is based in Somkhele in the south-western part of the Umkhanyakude district of northern KwaZulu-Natal, with access to laboratories and offices at the Doris Duke Medical Research Institute building in Umbilo. The Centre is located within the College of Health Sciences at the University. Community-based research on HIV epidemiology, prevention and treatment is conducted by the Centre which flourishes under the leadership of Professor Marie-Louise Newell. Major areas of research are demographic surveillance and the role of breastfeeding in mother-to-child transmission of HIV. The Centre, with core funding from the Wellcome Trust, hosts a large demographic and health surveillance system with annual household and individual surveillance of around 90 000 members of 11 000 households. The Africa Centre partners with the local Department of Health in the Hlabisa HIV Treatment and Care Programme – since 2004 thousands of people have been initiated on treatment at each of the 17 primary health care clinics. Comprehensive antiretroviral therapy (ART) coverage aims to reverse the substantial increase in HIV-related deaths in populations with a high prevalence of the disease. Using the data from its demographic surveillance system, the Centre has investigated trends in adult mortality before and after the introduction of the HIV treatment programme. The investigation showed a significant decline in overall population mortality and HIV-related adult mortality following ART roll-out, in a high HIV prevalence community. Subsequently, research has also shown a decline in early
Africa Centre for Health and Population Studies.
(0-2 years) childhood mortality and it was estimated that the decline was partly due to the roll-out of the PMTCT programme and the reduction in the number of HIV-infected children, but mostly due to the ART programme. The key objectives of the Centre’s current research initiatives (2007-2012) are: To further improve understanding of HIV dynamics and the impact of antiretroviral treatment (ART) roll-out at individual, household, clinic and community levels. To identify approaches to and target groups for interventions. To evaluate interventions at individual, household and community levels. To implement and further evaluate HIV treatment and prevention programmes. Research at the Centre is multi-disciplinary using demography, epidemiology, social sciences, clinical, virological, immunological, bio-informatics and data based expertise to build a comprehensive and exciting research portfolio aiming at further understanding the HIV dynamics in the rural area in which it operates. The resources which sustain all ongoing research include: the Africa Centre Demographic Information System (ACDIS) based on the socio-demographic household and the HIV behavioural surveillance, the Bio-informatics Unit, the Africa Centre Virology Laboratory at the Nelson R Mandela School of Medicine in Durban and the Hlabisa HIV Treatment and Care Programme. The social science research aims to fill the gaps in understanding behaviour relevant to acquiring or transmitting HIV, and to inform the development, and participate in the evaluation of, supportive interventions. The clinical research takes full advantage of the Centre’s presence in, and involvement with, the HIV Treatment and Care Programme delivery, while the population research charts the changing HIV epidemic in the area’s rural population, including the impact of the treatment programme.
UKZN Research Report 2010
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