Representations of MDR and XDR-TB in South African newspapers

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“…Protein secretion is essential for all bacteria to interact with their environment, and mycobacteria have, during coevolution with their host cell, acquired specialized protein secretory pathways that deliver effector proteins to the host cell. These include the ESAT-6 secretion system (ESX) that secretes proteins lacking a classical signal sequence (26). The genome of M.tb encodes five ESX regions (ESX-1 to ESX-5) arranged in conserved clusters.…”

“…ESX-5 is the most recently evolved ESX cluster and is only present in the group of slow-growing pathogenic species of mycobacteria (29). ESX-5 is responsible for the secretion of several proteins involved in virulence/pathogenicity (26) and is a major modulator of the host immune response and a key virulence determinant of M.tb. The inactivation of ESX-5 results in severe attenuation of the mutant strains, which are unable to replicate even in immune-deficient mice (30).…”

Towards understanding the drivers of policy change: a case study of infection control policies for multi-drug resistant tuberculosis in South Africa

“…Various policy proposals were put forward, but their feasibility was determined by the availability of resources, particularly in the form of adequate infrastructure [57, 58]. According to Kingdon [28], not all the proposals have the propensity to rise to the policy agenda as some are discarded due to the costs involved during implementation.…”

“…By drawing and sustaining public attention on the challenges posed by MDR-TB in South Africa, the media served as a conduit between the government and the public, a unifier of diverse viewpoints and a national watchdog that reflected and shaped the public discourse. For example, a study on the representations of MDR- and XDR-TB in 310 South African newspapers from February 2004 to July 2009 revealed three main themes, namely patient-centred causes (32.6%), lack of infection control procedures (18.7%) and health systems failures, while the solutions to tackling the disease focused on patient-targeted solutions (38.4%), improving infection control (12.3%), systems restructuring (10.6%) and diagnostic and therapeutic options (10%) [57]. What is explicit from the media coverage is the emphasis on ICP procedures as both a cause of and a solution to MDR- and XDR-TB.…”

The Need for a Model to Facilitate Health for Pregnant Learners Attending Secondary Schools in South Africa

“…Newspapers, which Oosthuizen (2012) and Daku, Gibbs and Heyman (2012) regard as important sources of knowledge for the general public and policy makers, reported frequently about pregnant learners in all nine provinces of the country (The Mercury 2012:14;Cape Times 2012:1;The Mail and Guardian 2012:23). Unlike in the past when pregnant learners were expelled from schools, these days the Department of Basic Education encourages them to continue attending and forbids school governing bodies from expelling these learners so that they are not further disadvantaged by lack of education (Department of Education, 2007;Bhana, Morrell, Shefer and Ngabaza, 2010).…”