We Are Treating AIDS Like a Woman Treats Her Wedded Partner
- Category: Health
- Date 15-08-2010
- 312 views
President Barrack Obama of the United States of America has lamented that international aid agencies may soon become fatigued with the spread of HIV in the African region. For every person enlisted for the uptake of antiretroviral therapy, about three others are newly infected with the virus; a very frustrating situation indeed.
It is similar to leaving a water-tap open and then starting to mop around the room in vain hope that it will ultimately dry up to present a hygienic environment. President Obama asked African governments to undertake behaviour change initiatives among the citizens to arrest the endemic spread of the virus because the current trend is both unacceptable and unsustainable.
“We are never going to have enough money to simply treat people who are constantly getting infected. We’ve got to have a mechanism to stop the transmission rate,” Obama pointed out.
The bond between HIV and an African is similar to that of a wedded couple; whereupon the husband and wife vow to stay together till ‘death’ do them part. At wedding ceremonies, couples generally promise to stick to each other in all conditions; conducive or harsh. Come rain or sunshine, illness or healthiness, wealth or destitution, joy or sorrow, rest or toil, couples declare to themselves that nothing should ever come between them.
From the time of their civic promises, evidence of a couple’s commitment to eternal adherence can only be seen not from constant public proclamations but from practical, undividable union. Perhaps this is not restricted to couples who are wedded but to all men and women living together with shared interests in raising a family. You cannot break their connection even if you use any force of money, argument, education, or assurances a better life.
This is the point we seem to have reached. That HIV and Aids kills is a widely known fact and many of us have witnessed relatives, friends, and neighbours suffering and dying of the same. That the virus is incurable is common knowledge. That a great majority of all HIV infections occurs through sex is a kindergarten rhyme; therefore sexually active individuals have the key in their hands to bolt the door HIV is using to wreck havoc.
That the disease is avoidable is not rocket science as the ways of prevention have been extensively publicised. They include: abstinence from sex, sticking to one sexual partner whose HIV status you know, proper and consistent use of condoms in irregular sexual affairs, as well as seeking counselling and testing services. Safe male circumcision has also been added to the blend of measures for checking the spread of HIV.
Colossal sums of money have been pumped into Africa to stem the menacing epidemic but the burden of the disease continues to grow by lips and bounds. Prevention services, in many cases, may be free-of-charge, but individuals and communities may shun them, giving the virus limitless chances to stride from host to host and multiply.
President Obama is right to raise the debate about this. The battle against HIV and Aids must not focus and stay at treatment level. The strategic point is at prevention level so that while people who are already infected with the virus can access life-sustaining therapy, we are not eternally adding to the pool of the infected. Unfortunately, this is where we are! It is ironical that while we are strongly advocating for the rights of people living with HIV to access treatment, we are also registering millions of new infections from time to time.
This is scandalous and defies logic. We are more or less saying that ‘donors have a duty to facilitate our access treatment, but we reserve our right to get infected’. Africa has learnt nothing from the devastation Aids has visited on us. We remain a stigmatised community: resigned to our fate like a wedded couple determined to endure the misery of their marriage that only a neighbour can get concerned about. President Barrack Obama must be that neighbour!
By Venansio Ahabwe
Source: The Comrade