Doctors Without Borders President Bernard Pecoul and Brazilian Health Minister Jose Serra yesterday signed a letter of intent stating that the not-for-profit group would work with Brazil to export the country's successful anti-AIDS model and its state-produced generic anti-AIDS drugs to other developing countries, Reuters/New York Times reports.

Rising death rates in South Africa due to HIV/AIDS have led to the creation of a makeshift funeral industry, Newsweek reports. Many "fly-by-night undertakers," who are unlicensed and operate out of storefronts, compete to make funeral arrangements and leave bodies to decompose while they search for the cheapest means of disposal, creating a health hazard and raising costs to the government.

Christian Solidarity International (CSI) on Thursday, 6 September, reported that one of its research teams, recently returned from the Afro-Arab borderlands of Sudan, had found systematic of human rights abuses, as a manifestation of racism, among a group of "97 female slaves above the age of 12 who were recently liberated from bondage."

This is a series of useful lesson resources on various topics related to modern-day slavery. The two-pagers on "Bonded Labour" and "Slavery from the past..." can be used by teachers as illustrative materials in civic education, history or other social science classrooms.

All states involved in the slave trade should acknowledge their role and issue a formal apology to victims and their descendants, say campaigners
marking an international day of slave trade remembrance.