SSS 2008-03-25

（单词翻译）

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science, I am Cynthia Graber. This will just take a minute.

 When it comes to saving lives, a personal touch can sometimes work better than drugs alone. That’s what researchers in Uganda found in a study published in the journal the Lancet. Scientists studied the efficacy of home-visits to AIDs patients in rural areas that aren't served by clinics. Lay workers with no clinical training visited patients weekly to provide potent¹ anti-AIDs drugs. The thousand study participants also received supporting interventions² including insecticide-treated bed nets to avoid malaria³ infection and a safe water system. After two years, researchers compared the results of the rural home visits to urban clinics that only administer drugs. In the rural homes AIDS-related mortality was reduced by more than 90%. There was also a sharp decline in child mortality from all causes.Additional cost for these results: 25 cents per patient per day.  Researchers caution that the dramatic benefits can’t be attributed to home-visits alone, and may have been aided by the additional measures, for example: bed nets. But the results are in line with similar studies conducted in other countries, such as Haiti.
 

Thanks for the minute for Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Cynthia Graber.