Laws and policies should be changed to pave the way for the kits' distribution, said Wits University academics Marlise Richter and Dr Francois Venter, and Andy Gray, a senior lecturer at the University of KwaZulu-Natal's medical school. ugg style boots "South Africa has reached a point in its Aids epidemic where individuals should be able to decide when and where they would like to test for HIV, and do so without having to involve anyone else," they said. They said the SA Medical Association (Sama) earlier this year warned the public against HIV self-testing kits. Sama had said it was risky for patients to test themselves "unmonitored", and warned this could lead to patients committing suicide. The warning had been echoed by the national department of health and the Treatment Action Campaign. The three experts said however the same objections would apply to any medical self test, including the existing test for type 1 diabetes, which had been a certain death sentence before there was widespread access to insulin. "The arguments against self-testing are largely based on vague fears with little or no evidence to support them," they said. ugg boots for cheap "It would seem sensible to provide increased access to HIV testing in a facilitatory way, encouraging people to access care in a way that suits them, rather than based on a model that encourages unnecessary 'Aids exceptionalism' and fear-mongering." They said it seemed that at present there was no legal impediment to supermarkets selling HIV testing kits, but that pharmacists were prevented by their code of practice from stocking them. There was no mechanism to regulate the quality and reliability of any self-tests, a matter which should be addressed urgently. Vuvuzelas can be a pain in the neck Writing in the latest issue of the SA Medical Journal, two German doctors have described what they say is the first case of a "vuvuzela-induced thyroid cyst". They said a 42-year-old man came to them complaining of painful swelling of the neck and difficulty in swallowing. ugg boots on sale An ultrasound scan confirmed a thyroid cyst, and the man's symptoms were relieved when the contents were drained with a needle. "On being asked whether he had raised heavy weights or pressed strongly, he responded that he had blown a vuvuzela during a recent World Cup soccer game," they said. The doctors, Alexander Mann and Kerstin Jungheim of the Endokrinologikum medical centre in Frankfurt, said thyroid cysts could appear spontaneously, and had been linked to activities which increased the pressure in the chest area. "For example, playing high notes on the trumpet, which belongs to the group of high-resistance instruments that includes the vuvuzela, may increase intrathoracic pressure up to 200cm H2O." ugg boots for sale Mann told Sapa on Monday that this represented a ten-fold increase in pressure. He said the fan, a German, had not incurred the injury in South Africa. He had been watching the game at a public viewing site in his home country. "We thought it was worth reporting," Mann said. "We thought it had some entertaining characteristics." South African researchers warned before the World Cup that the noise of the vuvuzela could lead to permanent hearing damage. cheap ugg boots