...and we're still not winning
It is 25 years since the global challenge of HIV/Aids was first identified, and the virus continues to spread round the world in a way that makes it clear that tackling it is not yet a top priority for the human race.
Reading the coverage in various newspapers of a new UN report on the disease, it was interesting to see the different conclusions drawn from the same facts by different commentators. The headline writers were largely negative: "World is losing HIV fight" said Associated Press; "25 years on, Aids still spreading" was the Christian Science Monitor's take, while the Guardian declared "Aids pandemic spreading to every corner of the globe, says UN", but look closer at the stories below the headlines and it's a bit more hopeful. That AP report sounds "an encouraging note" that "infection rates are falling in some heavily affected African countries, at least in part as a result of modified behavior among African youths"; the Telegraph actually reckons that the world's overall HIV infection rate has stabilised.
What is clear reading all the reports is that much more could and should be done. What they don't say, but is equally clear, is that the lack of action is largely due to the fact that most of the victims live in poor countries, and most are poor themselves. There are HIV-positive Westerners, but they get ARV drugs and can live normal lives for a normal span - though that could change if the virus manages to become resistant to enough drugs. The ones who die, because they don't get treatment, live in Africa and increasingly in Asia - India has just overtaken South Africa as the country with the highest number of sufferers, as the Telegraph chose to highlight.
It's not only that Western governmenst don't give enough priority to tackling the Aids crisis. The US government is actually doing its best to make things worse. They wouldn't put it that way, of course, but their pandering to the fundamentalist Christian right means that most of their aid for Aids programmes insists on abstinence and faithfulness as the cornerstones and has no room for condoms. If all HIV-sufferers - and all who aren't sure but might be - were angels this would work like a dream, but in the real world, particularly the macho culture of Africa, it hasn't a prayer. Uganda was the first African country to get Aids under control, using the ABC code: Abstinence, Be Faithful and if you can't do that, use a Condom. Under financial pressure to get as much US aid as they can, the 'C' has been dropped from the message they are putting out, and HIV rates are on the rise again. See today's report in the Independent.
One thing that should be worrying Western governments, though, is the situation in Russia and Eastern Europe generally. This was what the Independent chose to highlight yesterday. HIV-rates are heading skywards, plenty of other Europeans go to Russia and Eastern Europe, while Russians and East Europeans come here. In particular, many women come to work in the sex industry... and what's the easiest way to pass on HIV?
Maybe self-interest will eventually stir up some action where 25 million deaths have failed.
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