The U.N. Program on HIV and AIDS warns that stigma and discrimination against marginalized populations are driving both the AIDS crisis and COVID-19 and must be tackled and eliminated to end what officials call the dual, colliding pandemics. In a report released in advance of World AIDS Day on December 1, the U.N. agency called on governments to put the most vulnerable at the center of their pandemic responses.HIV/AIDS emerged nearly 40 years ago. While progress in the treatment of the disease has been made, AIDS remains a public health menace. …

As a second wave of coronavirus approaches, Africa has a plan, says the continent’s top health official.     In recent weeks, the continent has started to distribute 2.7 million rapid antigen tests. By mid-2021, health officials hope to vaccinate 60 percent of the continent’s population with one of the several promising new vaccines.     Now, says Dr. John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, it’s up to the continent’s leaders to try to make that happen.    “That will also require that we mobilize up to about $10 …

National reading and math tests long used to track what U.S. students know in those subjects are being postponed from next year to 2022 over concerns about whether testing would be feasible or produce valid results during the coronavirus pandemic, the National Center for Education Statistics announced Wednesday.The biennial National Assessment of Educational Progress evaluations used for the Nation’s Report Card were slated for early next year for hundreds of thousands of the country’s fourth- and eighth-graders. But widespread remote learning and health protocols would have added big complications and …