Aids, Poverty and Ignorance in South Africa

Aids, Poverty and Ignorance in South Africa

Twenty years after the first clinical evidence of Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) was reported, it has become the most devastating disease humankind has ever faced. Since the epidemic began, more than 60 million people have been infected with the virus worldwide. Data shows an estimated 57,520,805 infected people around the world with that number increasing by approximately 1,400 people per day (redribbon.co.za). AIDS is now the leading cause of death in sub-Saharan Africa. Worldwide, it is the fourth-biggest killer. At the end of 2003, an estimated 46 million people globally were living with AIDS. In many parts of the developing world, the majority of new infections occur in young adults, with young women especially vulnerable. About one-third of those currently living with AIDS are aged 15–24. Most of them do not know they carry the virus. Millions more know nothing or too little about AIDS to protect themselves against it. Dr. Malegaparu Makgoba, President of the Medical Research Council of South Africa, warns that “as Africa faces the challenges of its renewal or renaissance, there is no greater potential barrier to the attainment of this vision than the specter of the HIV/AIDS epidemic” (mrc.ac.za).

The most affected part of the world has been Sub-Saharan Africa, in particular South Africa. The groundbreaking article released at the end of 2002 by the Medical Research Council of South Africa, the “Impact of HIV/Aids on adult mortality in South Africa” report is the first comprehensive examination of mortality statistics from the AIDS era. In a strongly worded introduction to the report, Dr. Makgoba states that as a consequence of early beliefs that AIDS was a disease exclusively due to homosexuality and that “many Africans promoted the notion that homosexual practices were ‘unAfrican’, thus sowing the seeds for denial to justify why AIDS would not be prevalent in their communities” (mrc.ac.za). He believes that “this denial was compounded by stigmatization, chauvinism, the distortion of scientific evidence, and ignorance” (mrc.ac.za). The report shows data proving that AIDS is the biggest killer in South Africa—with an estimated 40% of adult deaths during 2003 were caused by AIDS.

According to the researchers of the ‘Impact of HIV/AIDS on Adult Mortality in South Africa’, AIDS will continue to be a growing problem in South Africa.