AIDS awareness program in Kenya
Introduction
Since its appearance in 1981, acquired immune deficiency syndrome, more commonly known as AIDS, has claimed the lives of over 33.2 million people—over 4.3 million of them have been children. According to the UN, AIDS “threatens development, social cohesion, political stability, food security and life expectancy and imposes a devastating economic burden that requires urgent action.”
HIV, the virus that causes AIDS and AIDS pose a serious problem for public health. However, HIV/AIDS also poses challenges to development and security. The illness is spreading throughout the world, and many millions of infected people do not receive treatment. Whole communities can be affected and entire workforces can die. In these communities, children are left without parents, often must leave school to take on jobs to support their families, and government services are stretched to their limits. When a government can no longer provide for its people, civil unrest and violence often follow.
Tackling HIV/AIDS means more than just funding research to find a cure. Today, the UN and member countries realize that to address the issue on a social context of an entire country, the world must focus on other aspects, especially the expansion of education and health services.
AIDS is caused by HIV, which stands for human immunodeficiency virus. HIV destroys the body’s immune system—its ability to fight infections and cancers. HIV progresses to AIDS when too many immune cells in the body have died, or when the person contracts an infection, such as pneumonia, that would not as severely affect a healthy person.
Without drug treatment, HIV usually takes about a decade to progress to AIDS. With HIV medicines, called anti-retroviral drugs, and modern medical services, a person can live normally with HIV for a very long time. Although there is no cure, these modern therapies can make HIV a manageable disease. However, these expensive therapies are not available to millions of people around the world.
Although AIDS is a deadly problem in every country, developed nations use their resources to make drugs available to people with HIV and AIDS. Medical treatments can prevent mothers with AIDS from passing the disease into their babies. Modern therapies can help people with HIV live long lives, and can alleviate the suffering of people dying of AIDS. These developed nations also run campaigns to educate people about how to avoid contracting HIV.
Limited access to medication for HIV/AIDS patients is a large problem in developing countries. These countries do not have the means to distribute AIDS drugs or to provide expensive medical services to people with HIV/AIDS. They often cannot even afford to educate their populations about proper HIV prevention. Poverty, ignorance and poor government infrastructure make HIV especially disastrous for people in the developing world, and a devastating phenomenon for developing countries.
Of the many regions affected by the AIDS epidemic, sub-Saharan Africa has suffered the most. Sub-Saharan Africa comprises 41 countries and occupies most of the African continent. This region has over twice the number of people with HIV/AIDS as every other country in the world, combined. Of the 2.1 million people who died of AIDS in 2007, 1.6 million—a staggering 76 percent—occurred in sub-Saharan Africa.
Background
The exact origin of HIV/AIDS is highly disputed. Although the first known case of HIV infection was in the United States in 1981, it is usually linked to a rare virus found in chimpanzees from Western Africa.4 HIV/AIDS is classified as a sexually transmitted infection (STI). However, the virus can also be transmitted through blood transfusions, intravenous drug use and even from a mother to her unborn child.
According to the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) and the World Health Organization (WHO), the number of people living with HIV in 2007 was 33.2 million people, a reduction of almost 16% from the 2006 estimates of 39.5 million people. In 2007 alone, 2.5 million people were newly infected with HIV, of which 68% occurred in sub-Saharan Africa. Ninety percent of all children infected with HIV life in sub-Saharan Africa.
Even though millions of people die of AIDS every year, and millions of people become infected by it, the spread of HIV/AIDS can be slowed. With a little education, HIV transmission can be easily prevented, and with access to the right treatments, people who have HIV can live normally for a very long time. People with HIV can take anti-retroviral drugs (drugs that stop the progression of certain viruses). Since HIV has the ability to mutate very quickly, it is best to take a combination of anti-retroviral drugs as prescribed by a doctor or nurse. These drugs do not cure HIV, but they help control the virus.
WHO estimates that less than seven percent of people in developing countries who urgently need anti-retroviral drugs actually have access to them. In many cases, the drugs are too expensive. In addition, taking anti-retroviral drugs is a complicated process; people must be able to understand how to take the medicines and must visit their healthcare centre for frequent check-ups. But in developing countries, people living with HIV may live too far away from a clinic to visit regularly. Also, if they cannot read, healthcare workers must explain in person how to take the drugs. But many developing countries do not have the resources to provide these drugs and medical services.
With HIV/AIDS creating large populations of orphans and weakened adults, the infrastructures of developing countries fall apart. In addition to failures in health and education systems, the military and police suffer. Many times, rates of infection in the military are higher than rates of infection in the rest of the population. Because of this, the ability of a military or police force to protect citizens is impaired. Without health and educational services and without sufficient defences, people become dissatisfied with the government. Communities compete for services, causing rifts in the nation. These countries are very vulnerable to political instability and conflict.
Sub-Saharan Africa and AIDS
Sub-Saharan Africa remains the most affected region in the global AIDS epidemic. More than two thirds (68%) of all people HIV-positive live in this region where more than three quarters (76%) of all AIDS deaths in 2007 occurred. It is estimated that 1.7 million people were newly infected with HIV in 2007, bringing to 22.5 million the total number of people living with the virus. Unlike other regions, the majority of people living with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa (61%) are women. In 2007, 12.1 million children in the region were AIDS orphans.
As in other regions, HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa kills people in the work force and government, raises the cost of health care and shortens life expectancy. But here, other factors like government instability, corruption and war, already create some of the worst poverty levels in the world. HIV/AIDS only worsens developmental problems, making it more difficult for sub- Saharan African countries to pull themselves out of poverty.
Poor communities are more likely to be affected by the AIDS epidemic, and they suffer more severely. The poor cannot afford proper AIDS treatments, and their hospitals are quickly overwhelmed by people with AIDS. People with HIV/AIDS require expensive medication, and in the advanced stages of AIDS, they cannot work or provide for their families. Whole societies suffer as a result.
In Burkina Faso 20 percent of rural families have reduced their agricultural work or even abandoned their farms because of AIDS. At one company in Botswana the number of employees who could no longer work because of AIDS-related sickness rose 75 percent.
In addition, children are often taken out of school so that they can help care for family members and to avoid paying school fees. Increasing numbers of children are not receiving a basic education. The number of children enrolling in primary school in Africa in 2001 was 20 percent less than the number that enrolled in 1998. Even gender equality suffers. Because families are more likely to withdraw their female children from school, fewer women are educated enough to find high-status jobs.
Without proper education, many people will not know or understand the relatively easy ways to avoid contracting HIV. Ignorance and fear of AIDS leads to discrimination. In Nigeria, for example, a study revealed that one in 10 healthcare workers refuse to treat people with HIV/AIDS, for fear of catching the illness.
“By overwhelming Africa’s health and social services, by creating millions of orphans, and by decimating health workers and teachers, AIDS is causing social and economic crises which in turn threaten political stability,” Peter Piot, Director of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), said during a Security Council discussion of the issue.
Past International Action
In the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS, adopted by the General Assembly in 2001, the UN established global prevention targets, including the worldwide reduction of AIDS by 25 percent by 2010. However, this goal now seems unattainable as the number of HIV/AIDS cases continues to rise. Actions outlined in the resolution include working with local and regional organizations to educate youth on methods of protection, distributing safe sex materials, leading open discussion on the facts and fears of HIV/AIDS, and addressing political commitments. But many nations have not yet begun to run HIV/AIDS programs because they are expensive and time-consuming to set up.
The World AIDS Campaign (WAC) began in 1997. WAC seeks to educate people about the disease and make sure that social groups, such as homosexuals and Africans, are not unfairly discriminated against. They also mobilize governments in the fight against AIDS. Currently, WAC urges governments to act on their commitments to help developing nations receive the resources they need to fight AIDS.
UNAIDS and WHO ran the “Three-by-Five Initiative.” This program intended to treat three million people living with HIV/AIDS by the end of 2005. Some strategies included starting education programs about HIV/AIDS, increasing developing countries’ access to anti-retroviral drugs, promoting information-sharing among nations so that all can benefit from international research and creating new funds so that nations can afford HIV/AIDS programs. Although the Three-by-Five Campaign did not reach its goal, it did reach nearly almost a million people. 500,000 people in sub-Saharan Africa alone were being treated with anti-retroviral drugs by June of 2005, more than three times the number who had been treated in 2004.
The rates of success vary throughout sub-Saharan Africa. East Africa is showing gradual decline in the number of people with AIDS. The prevalence of AIDS in southern Africa has declined very slightly, and prevalence in west and central Africa does not appear to have declined at all.
In 2000, the Security Council passed Resolution 1308, which focused on maintaining international security in regions affected by the AIDS crisis, preventing AIDS among UN peacekeepers and encouraging member states to cooperate in AIDS prevention and treatment strategies. As the number of AIDS victims continues to grow, the Security Council has shown increasing concern for international security. The UN Security Council has convened about the issue of HIV/AIDS and its threat to security four times in the year 2005 alone.