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In Africa, AIDS means not only death but other devastation
Home > Journalism > AIDS

This is the old Ternyata site, maintained for archival purposes. You can see the new site at http://www.ternyata.org
Rosalind Russell
628 words
14 May 2000
The Star-Ledger Newark, NJ
(c) 2000. The Star-Ledger. All rights reserved.

AIDS has killed 11 million people in sub-Saharan Africa, has left 8 million children orphaned and will wipe out a quarter of the region's population in the next 20 years.

The statistics are easy to reel off. But what lies behind the cold demographic facts is still uncertain - the potentially apocalyptic consequences of the epidemic in Africa are only slowly starting to reveal themselves.

Economists say AIDS is the continent's No. 1 obstacle to development, outranking crippling debt, corruption and armed conflict.

The precise economic impact is uncertain. Information is poor and often suppressed by governments reluctant to disclose the extent of the disaster to potential investors.

''There is such a massive meltdown in many of these economies anyway - mix AIDS into that and it's very difficult to actually measure any impact," said Elizabeth Pisani, an independent consultant on AIDS policy in Africa.

Anecdotal evidence suggests the costs are already high.

Studies of farming households where a family member has AIDS shows food production falls, savings dwindle and children are more likely to be malnourished.

A new report by South African consulting firm FSA-Contact said that 11.4 percent of South African workers died as a result of AIDS in 1998. Within five years, companies will need to employ 20 percent more labor to maintain current output levels.

The social impact of AIDS is even more difficult to quantify, but there are already plenty of frightening statistics.

In some areas of Kenya, one third of all 19-year-olds are HIV-positive. In the Ivory Coast, AIDS kills a teacher every schoolday.

But on a continent where extremely high levels of adult mortality were the norm until two generations ago, some communities have adapted quickly to this new scourge.

''People have adapted to awful conditions and very high death rates in this continent for many years," said Pisani. "Yes, AIDS is devastating social structures, but life does go on."

Extended families have banded together to care for the sick and orphaned themselves. But the magnitude of the crisis means that even centuries-old coping strategies are under strain.

Some are turning elsewhere - the attraction of the murderous Ugandan cult which demanded hard labor in return for salvation can be better understood in the context of a small country which already has more than 1 million AIDS orphans.

Africa has become fertile ground for evangelist preachers promising cures for AIDS, while many countries have witnessed a resurgence of gruesome witchcraft rituals.

Last month, the U.S. government declared AIDS a threat to national security that could touch off ethnic wars, topple governments and undo years of democracy-building.

Dramatic declines in life expectancy, initially in sub-Saharan Africa, will increase the risk of "revolutionary wars, ethnic wars, genocides and disruptive regime transitions," the U.S. said in a study.

AIDS claimed 10 times more lives in Africa than wars last year. While there is no evidence yet that the epidemic lies behind the continent's many conflicts, analysts say AIDS could fuel political instability in already fragile countries.

Rwanda's 1994 genocide sparked massive displacement and refugee movements, resulting in a jump in HIV prevalence in rural areas from three percent to 11 percent and undermining the country's painful recovery.

In South Africa, high levels of urban crime are set to skyrocket due to changing demographics caused by AIDS.

''The large number of juveniles in the general population, many of them orphans who have been through trauma, will result in more and more lawlessness," said crime researcher Martin Schonteich. "No amount of state spending can counter that." ll package this with the AIDS jump

 

 

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