Missouri University Spearheads AIDS Research in Cameroon

Dr. Carole McArthur, professor of oral biology at University of Missouri-Kansas City, is the organizer and director of the U.S.-Cameroon Health Program, which focuses on HIV screening at more than a dozen sites in Cameroon. Many challenges confront her work: distance; a lack of funding, equipment, facilities and trained health-care providers; many Africans' reliance on traditional healers; and doubts that AIDS even exists.

McArthur began the project seven years ago by going from hospital to hospital in Africa searching for collaborators. In general, the U.S. members of the project provide expertise and equipment, while Cameroon provides personnel, facilities and residents willing to take an HIV test. Since 1997, more than 100,000 people have been screened for the disease. Most of the blood samples are sent to researchers in the United States for analysis.

One researcher aided by the project's work is Dr. Sunil Ahuja, professor of medicine and director of the Veterans Affairs center at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio. Ahuja is looking into how genes affect people's risk of getting HIV and how they affect progression to AIDS. McArthur and her Cameroon colleagues have been successful in finding large groups of people who meet Ahuja's criteria for research subjects; their blood is sent to him for his research.

Yet the program needs hard cash to pay its staff, replace decades-old equipment and reopen an eye clinic that was forced to close after the ophthalmologist could not be paid. In addition, McArthur would like to open a TB clinic. Her goal is to raise $1 million to $2 million to ensure the future of the project. "If we can help get Africa back to health, isn't that good for everyone?" she asked.

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