Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users

Resource manual for support workers in community-based AIDS organizations to help them learn how to address the changing face of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, particular the increasing needs of drug users who become HIV positive. The manual suggests skills and approaches for providing support to substance users, with chapters on the topics of: Attitudes, Values and Beliefs; Relationships, Boundaries and Ethics; Listening Skills; Self Care; Harm Reduction; Stages of Changing Behaviour; and Policies and Procedures. The manual ends with a comprehensive list of reading resources and national and provincial services dealing with substance use and/or HIV/AIDS.

Working Positive: Returning to Life; National Working Positive Coalition (NWPC) Guiding Principles; Choosing an Employment Program; Project KEEP - a 3 year project to identify and develop service strategies for overcoming barriers to employment for people with HIV/AIDS; Group Employment Counselling: "Making a Plan"; Frequently asked Questions about Rehabilitation and Employment Services for PLWHA; Patching the Medical Safety Net; Approval of Sculptra Recommended; Why Work?

Special issue on vulnerability of people with HIV/AIDS to TB, malaria and Hepatitis. Articles include: TB treatment evolves; The Next Frontier in TB Drug Development; Vaccinate to Prevent Hepatitis B; Characteristics of HIV, HBV, HCV (chart); The Ecology of Drug Resistance; HCV Snapshots: Macro to Micro - HCV prevalence in Europe tracked; TB is about People

HIV and Host Genetics: Complexity and Contradiction; Higher Sustiva Levels seen in some African-Americans; Best of the 11th Annual Retrovirus Conference Webcasts; World Community Advisory Boards: Focus on International Drug Pricing; Resistance to RNA inhibition of HIV found in study; Boosted Reyataz: 48-Week Results, Comparable to Kaletra; Issues of power and politics at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and in government clinical trials networks.