Francois Venter
@FrancoisVenter3
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HIV/infectious diseases and now non-communicable diseases researcher at Wits, legally accredited 'Google expert'
Joined April 2012
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President Ramaphosa kicking ass, taking names on the travel ban. And finally vaccines, not lockdowns, the right response to this sodding virus.
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On behalf of a continent: "Told you fucking so".
"The patient did not report any links with South Africa."
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I just got searched at ORT security screening on the way to CROI because of suspicious orange fibers on my laptop bag that could have been explosive residue.
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"“Nothing to date has happened and when I mean nothing, I mean the word zero. They are still getting reports as well as engineering feedback. I don’t even think they have proper costing on how much it would cost to repair certain aspects,” said Mahomed.""
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Infectious diseases dr here - please be careful with this advice. Early steroid (prednisone) use is dangerous; the rest I can't vouch for re therapeutic use, but some of these agents (diclofam,disprin) have serious overlapping toxicities. Also a lot of drugs we know little about.
@Enghumbhini
@MzwaneleManyi
@Taki7705
@SABCNews
After infection for treatment at home : Prednisone, Sinupret Forte, Diclofam,AC200, disprin and supplements like zinc, vitamin C, niacin, Tumeric powder
Eucalyptus, dandelion tea, garlic , onion , ginger ,
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How about every fucking minister's salary gets withheld until every Sassa beneficiary gets paid? Then all this 'we are here for the poor' blather would actually materialise.
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🤣🤣Best day. Years of underfunding, the target of every nutjob SA has to offer, dedicated service over listeria, lassa, MDR TB, rabies, HIV and two years of hell and COVID-19, NICD finally loses its shit.
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Sigh, I couldn't attend medical school unless I was vaccinated against hepatitis B.
ATTENTION‼️ Hello Witsies! This is the position of the Wits SRC on the Mandatory Vaccine Policy. We look forward to hearing your views on this matter.
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In SA, only available to professionals. In Holland, on discount shelf in the food supermarket while you queue.
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C'mon,
@Nature
, you couldn't find a SINGLE Southern hemisphere scientist to quote for this story? They were integral to finding Omnicron. Really uncool.
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Well. Optimus Floater gets shut down. One lie too far, I guess.
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Fuck off. The first cases in South Africa came from Italy. Did we blame Italians? Fuck. Right. Off.
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Can. We. Please. Just. Stop. Studying. Fucking. Ivermectin. After. This. Bless this group.
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Because scientists who DO the work appreciate what he did.
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@helenzille
I'm an author of this piece, reminding you of a prior tweet. Please will you and the DA call out the other issues stopping progress: patent protection, secret backroom pharma deals, and hoarding in rich countries?
@HealthJusticeIn
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This actually is not good enough anymore. This article did a tremendous amount of damage. The Journal should have analysed how peer review fell down, perhaps have someone independent comment on reviews. See how this may be improved on. A bland statement like this doesn't help.
Often referenced "masks do harm" study retracted.
See:
Editors: "...complaints were valid ... the article does not meet the standards of editorial & scientific soundness..."
Will likely live on as a zombie & retraction part of a conspiracy narrative.
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Thank goodness. A single sensible senior politician. None of the major political parties have crowned themselves in glory when it came to vaccines, tbh. Perhaps use your local experts, instead of importing nutcases?
Neither the Western Cape Department of Health and Wellness, nor the Premier’s Office, was in any way involved with the event hosted by the provincial legislature, and distance themselves from the purported views expressed by the invited speaker.
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And no, he didn't stand up to big pharma. He wasn't some amazing alternative thinker. His parliament had free access to ARVs while South Africans died unnecessarily in their 100s of 1000s. And NO accountability.
"When people say to me HIV causes AIDS, I say one virus causes a syndrome. You can't say one virus causes all of these illnesses. What you can say is that this virus impacts negatively on the immune system." - Former president Thabo Mbeki.
#MbekiLecture
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No local cardiologists allied themselves with him. Speaks volumes.
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People seem puzzled why so many treating clinicians react to Malhotra so publicly and so angrily. Read this and understand how noxious his behaviour is. Manipulative, cynical, unkind, reckless. The people who brought him to SA should be ashamed.
If you’re unsure what “dogwhistling” is… this is a great example.
Ostensibly, a physician is expressing condolences for the tragic death of a young boy. That seems normal and appropriate.
But Malhotra knows his audience. 🧵
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Again, the grinding research work in infectious diseases, the huge benefits of vaccines in children, and why health workers everywhere should be fighting for access. And against those people who undermine possibly our most effective medical intervention.
@WitsVIDA
proudly involved in first study to show 82% efficacy (reduced risk) against severe Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV) lower respiratory tract infection (LRTI) by vaccinating their mothers during pregnancy with a RSV protein vaccine. Published in NEJM today.
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If only there was a safe, readily available, evidence-based preventive intervention for these respiratory viruses.
Information coming from Serbia is that Novak Djokovic had a severe flu against Jannik Sinner which explained the loss.
"He got a fever the night before the semi-final. Something similar to what Zverev had. He was sick for three weeks, and then he had a relapse. That's why he
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When you are feeling bleak, remember what this country can get done with the right leadership and resources. Pretty damn impressive in such a short time.
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This is going to be ground-breaking (couldn't say cool) - major data now showing the direct impact on health in South Africa of this increased warming. And why anyone in health (and probably on the planet) needs to sit up and take notice.
@WitsUniversity
@WitsHealthFac
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I just snorted my coffee. I think it was while spelling 'crushing irony' in my head.
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About damn time, talk about missing in action. And what about the ivermectin nutters?
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@Richard_Spoor
Dude, I've been lecturing Wits postgrads on viral immunology, evolution and epidemiology for over 20 years. Your tweets are scientifically embarrassing. Take the time to learn the field (or at least read the papers you post), or stop talking nonsense.
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I'm curious. Despite the legislation,
@COVID_19_ZA
, has a single person been prosecuted successfully for spreading disinformation?
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Why is our health minister being nice to this tosser or his idiot government?
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Just circling back to those travel bans. Please forward to your fave N hemisphere politician. It is almost like they didn't work. In fact.... (Thanks, NYT).
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@Richard_Spoor
@pierredevos
Richard, infectious diseases doc here, I don't think your sources are correct. Marek's is a very different virus, I have not seen anything to support your statement on SARS-CoV-2. The current variants all arose in unvaccinated populations.
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Shocked. Totally shocked. Who could've predicted but from every other vaccine study? (I love studies, though, where they casually have 'n=16,993,389')
Turns out myocarditis and other cardiac events actually do happen 6-10 times more often after infection than vaccination. Who knew? (everyone)
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CROI 2023. Why 'move more and eat less' medical advice to lose weight is so lacking evidence, so cruel; we need interventions for effective weight loss.
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I really am at the stage where I think the only way we will ever get any traction and honesty, is if senior politicians and officials are forced to use the facilities they are responsible for. Otherwise, it is always this - long explanations and no accountability.
The
@GautengHealth
's response to the open letter a doctor at the
@RahimaHospital
penned about horrendous conditions at some GP hospitals.👇🏾👇🏾👇🏾
@SECTION27news
@DrMokgethi
@PublicHealthSA
@ShabirMadh
@FrancoisVenter3
@SHA_ZAR
@JackBloomDA
@SAMedicalAssoc
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Jeez. Vaccines work. Who knew?
NEW: I’m not sure people appreciate quite how bad the Covid situation is in Hong Kong, nor what might be around the corner.
First, an astonishing chart.
After keeping Covid at bay for two years, Omicron has hit HK and New Zealand, but the outcomes could not be more different.
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And those of us who work with all of these, know how frankly impossible it would be to get this lot to form an orderly queue.
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Just a reminder to the NGO-haters of the last 24 hours, of what NGOs achieve. In between fighting state capture, corruption, politician arrogance, big business secret deals, you name it...
1 September 2023:
🔊🔊🔊 Breaking: 🔊🔊🔊
The South African Government will *not appeal* HJI Contract Transparency Judgment, and will comply with Court Order.
PRESS STATEMENT:
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We have such low quality politicians. Sickening that a starting point is punishing children, and not properly resourcing schools, fixing borders policies, ending corruption in Home Affairs.
All children of illegal foreigners shouldn’t be allowed in our schools in South Africa, Home Affairs should visit all schools before we do, this is nonsense, we must now explain to South African parents why they children cannot be placed in schools , we warned you.
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Hate the 'mine is bigger than yours' disease nonsense, as always need to ask 'was it preventable and treatable?' but this one is for the COVID minimisers. Now to fix TB and HIV and malaria.
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@DrJenGunter
, your South African following has finally taken delivery, despite COVID efforts, thank you.
@Melusi_MD
, a gem of a book.
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Oh, another SA politician too lazy to pick up a phone to a virologist before a cringeworthy tweet.
@helenzille
5/5 Omicron, hopefully, is showing that the virus is mutating "down" and that we are building up herd immunity. While it is highly infectious, it is not nearly as deadly. Far worse to continue killing our economy and give the ANC an excuse to increase centralised control.
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@Richard_Spoor
You realise this is about antibody-dependent enhancement, which talks to disease severity, not variants? And that 10 months later, we're pretty clear it's not a thing? I suggest you get better sources of virology and immunology information.
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No deaths, everything in line with international experience with these vaccines.
Read the Media release about adverse events following immunisation (AEFIs)
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Unbelievable - not the police, not Correctional Services, not G4S - and definitely not anyone in parliament until this week. Again, we have to rely on legal people with integrity and journalists doing their job. One huge cover-up but for someone taking a stand.
Former justice Edwin Cameron of the Judicial Inspectorate for Correctional Services leaked the report that found that the burnt body was not Bester's
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The apex predators take a moment from harassing the owner.
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Hysterical? Obscure? It's Tulio's fault your idiot contemporaries don't understand viral transmission (which isn't that hard)? Twit.
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73 people burned alive and counting, and its the fault of... NGOs? Fuck her, and all our useless politicians, who have had DECADES to fix this.
[WATCH] City of Johannesburg Speaker Colleen Makhubele says there are NGOs that are determined to prevent the council from dealing with hijacked buildings, referring to Kenny Kunene receiving backlash for his attempt to evict people from illegally occupied and unsafe structures.
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When your rogue health worker says ivermectin is 'safe' for COVID treatment or prevention
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Unfuckingbelievable (for those puzzled, it is a (very dated) conference abstract and iffy methods, and the authors have reacted with horror at these tweets). But who needs science training when you have followers and confidence?
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After all the drama on Monday and our 'shutdown ', just landed in Paris, and maybe SA needs a reminder what a proper shutdown looks like. French make the EFF look like a church bazaar organising committee.
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Europe! Clean up your act.
On the left is Germany newspaper
@rheinpfalz
with a headline “The Virus from Africa is with us.”
On the right is a Spanish newspaper
@TribunaAlbacete
with a cartoon saying black South Africans are coming to Europe on a boat with Omicron Covid-19 variant.
This is racism in 2021!
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Don't mess with Dr Rasmussen. For the trolls and the Pandas and our fave Mpumalanga lawyer, because they don't seem to understand, immunology is vok hard. You don't dabble and become an expert.
Tell me you don’t understand immunology without telling me you don’t understand immunology.
Vaccines do not change your DNA, indirectly or “a tiny bit.”
He’s referring to V(D)J recombination, which occurs normally. It’s fundamental to our immune system.
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"Renowned" -
@DrAseemMalhotra
You can't seem to get a public place to speak? Afraid of some tough 'ethical' questions? We have some renowned cardiologists of our own, who actually publish research. How much did you get paid for this junket?
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Getting PrEP to people in a way that makes it far easier.
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Idiocy. They are fully vaccinated. They going to close their borders every time a new variant comes around? It is probably already there anyway. Only made sense in the rush to vaccinate.
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Starting to agree with this in SA.
"How about we stop using the expression Social Determinants of Health? When what we mean is Political Obstacles to Health."
Just paraphrasing Rudolf Virchow, seen below agreeing with me:
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Didn't take our new saviour long to show his true xeno colours.
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HIV vaccine people deserve a special kind of medal. But dammit.
Today
@JanssenUS
announced that the DSMB review of the MOSAICO phase 3 HIV vaccine study determined that the vaccine was no effective in preventing HIV. Incredibly disappointing that yet another HIV vaccine fails to show efficacy in a clinical trial.
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Jislaaik, can't we EVER get a break in health? Like, you had to bring back the bloke who made even Manto look hands-on? Who wasted how much money on pilot projects for NHI? Who couldn't win a court case in Home Affairs he was so useless?🤬Cyril🤬
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Cheers, Seattle. First normal-feeling conference since COVID. Great to see old and new collaborators and colleagues. Not going to miss the jet lag or eye watering exchange rate, though!
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"High HPV vaccination coverage of girls and 2 lifetime cervical screens could eliminate cervical cancer among women overall in South Africa by the end of the century..."
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Unbelievable. Shoot (often literally) the messenger. Won't look after our public health services, won't use them, often plunder them, and then have a hissy fit when criticised. Sign. And stop voting for politicians who use private health care, otherwise this will never stop.
Sign in support for the immediate reversal of a frankly idiotic decision.
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Stock up on popcorn now. I DOUBLE-dare you to mention herd immunity or South Africa's ''unique trajectory'' in question time.
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I'm not mentioning any names.
If your favorite “insert diet here” guru is anti-vax, you should probably be questioning their ability to evaluate science, & think twice about their health/nutrition advice.
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Invented mRNA tech, se voet. Grifting getting just a teeny bit harder for the pseudo-scientist nutjobs.
Absolutely the worst spreader of vaccine disinformation on social media has finally been suspended. 520K followers.
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NICD rocks!! Well done, Waasila and team
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This is excellent news!
Normalised cases and admissions for Gauteng showing signs of decoupling. Suggests immunity from prior infections and/or vaccinations are providing some protection from severe COVID19 disease.
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"Just flu" se voet
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Ooooh, a really useful ready-made social excuse, Mo. No. More. Team. Building.
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"Professor Glenda Gray... said: “Despite the rhetoric, homosexuality is not a pernicious western import. If anything, it´s state-sponsored homophobia that´s un-African and against the principles of Ubuntu, not homosexuality.”
@GmyworldG
@Avaaz
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One of the funniest threads you will see on Twitter today.
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Pretty damn amazing. And a signal to countries battling with idiotic culture wars what focused, scientific prevention can achieve (granted, well resourced).
1/3: Virtually eliminating
#HIV
transmission in inner-city
#Sydney
, where HIV was once most prevalent in
#Australia
, is beyond exciting. It affirms that Australia is poised to be one of the first countries, if not the first, to achieve virtual elimination of HIV.
#IAS2023
🧵
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Just a reminder that SA has previously imported grifters galore. Not just AIDS denialists and discredited cardiologists.
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AKA our asshole, entitled politicians illegally bullying and assaulting residents after a decade of fucking up our city, insulting them for being 'caretakers', and demanding unearned 'respect', tearing down buildings in areas they haven't looked after forever.
Kunene gets into a heated exchange with the caretaker of Park Lane flat who is refusing to disclose the owners of the property.
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"At one point, he baselessly asserted that vaccine research had been responsible for the creation of some of the deadliest diseases in human history, including HIV, the Spanish flu, and Lyme disease." Quack central.
Thank you
@RollingStone
for covering
@RobertKennedyJr
exactly as he should be covered -- a grifter pushing deadly lies and deliberate disinformation.
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This is so exciting. And these Pipeline reports are so useful.
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Wonderful article on break-through infections. ''These cases are, on average, gentler and less symptomatic; faster-resolving, with less virus lingering—and, it appears, less likely to pass the pathogen on. ''
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If they were in power, this would be Manto-2 level shit. Why are SA politicians incapable of picking up the phone to get advice?
#ivermectin
saves lives. The Uttar Pradesh province in India is proof.
It should be rolled out en-masse to all SA'ns.
To-date,
@GovernmentZA
has ignored us - pushing so called 'vaccines' only, looking to make them mandatory, and ignoring their harms - which are piling up.
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@TimModise
@ShabirMadh
@Jay_Naidoo
Shabir was in pitched battle with government throughout COVID, fighting for schools to be opened, lockdowns to be lifted, for transparency, for coherent PCR policy. Jay was nowhere to be seen.
@TimModise
@Jay_Naidoo
@ShabirMadh
. Why is Shabir not the human rights activist, Tim?
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Imagine being these parents. Imagine being part of a government that can't diagnose why 21 children suddenly died, after a year, with no idea if/when/how it may happen again.
One year later, parents demand full autopsy reports for Enyobeni Tavern victims
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Why aren't we doing this, South Africa? Poverty alleviation interventions work.
If we give people with tuberculosis food baskets, what's the impact?
Better nutrition in contacts of patients with TB reduced incidence infectious TB by nearly 50%!
Amazing RATIONS trial in
@TheLancet
&
@LancetGH
today
@dranuragb
@dr_madhavib
@doctorsoumya
@ddgtb2017
et al
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"By securing this victory, Ramphadi added his name to the history books, becoming the first male South African, both able-bodied and wheelchair, to win a French Open title since Johan Kriek accomplished the feat in 1981."
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How many fucking finals can you fit into one weekend? I'm off to do basejumping to calm my nerves
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It is hard to get across how hard people like Nelesh and others have worked to get flucytosine to SA - so many years of heroic grinding away at the system!
The best news after many years of advocacy!
@SAHPRA1
has registered (Viatris) flucytosine in South Africa.
This is a real landmark for HIV cryptococcal meningitis treatment and will FINALLY ensure that this essential antifungal medicine is widely available at all facilities
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