The Role Of AIDS In Sub-Saharan Africa

An AIDS orphan refers to any child younger than 18 years old who lost one or both parents related to HIV (Van Rooyen et al, 2012). Statistics and estimated calculations from the United Nations

Stephanie Nolen was already known for her work as the Globe and Mail’s Africa correspondent, ranging from the effects of war on women and children, to Stephen Lewis’ fight to end AIDS in Africa, when she published 28 Stories of AIDS in Africa in 2007. 28 is Nolen’s attempt to reflect the 28 million Africans who had HIV in 2007. Nolen gathered the testimonies of 28 individuals including orphans, miners, grandmothers, soldiers, the clergy, and Nelson Mandela. In this book, Nolen seamlessly integrates personal stories of the victims with shocking statistics and engrossing quotes, effortlessly bring a ‘human face’ to the HIV/AIDS epidemic. This is a great piece of work demanding both empathy and immediate action.

An issue like this affects the whole world, whether people realize it or not. If orphans have no one to look after them, sometimes they can become scared or upset- or even violent and reckless.

Despite the government’s best efforts to downplay the HIV epidemic that was beginning in South Africa, the disease began to spread throughout the general population in the late 1980s. In 1988, cases of seroconversion started to appear in individuals outside of the MSM community; each year, between 1988 and 1994, saw a doubling of HIV prevalence. As of 1990, the dominant mode of transmission for HIV switched from homosexual to heterosexual intercourse, creating an epidemic among the citizens of South Africa. At the same time, the rate of mother-to-child transmission was on the rise. Throughout the escalation of the HIV epidemic in South Africa, the apartheid government took a hard line stance on HIV and AIDS, calling it a ‘black disease’ and refusing to invest resources to combat the spate. Rather, it continued to use fear tactics and stereotyping to reinforce the ‘typical’ HIV-infected individual, targeting MSM and black populations in country-wide campaigns. Any attempts at preventing the spread of disease were usually thwarted by a lack of infrastructure in the local governments and provinces, with each area attempting a different strategy to combat HIV infection.

Africa has a history of facing many challenges, including starvation, poverty, Ebola and AIDS. AIDS, however, has become Africa’s biggest hurdle. Botswana, located in Southern Africa, has been hit the hardest by the AIDS virus with over 23% of its population contracting AIDS. In order to help fix the AIDS epidemic in Botswana, multiple things need to be reviewed, such as understanding how AIDS spread throughout Botswana, where the region currently stands on the AIDS virus, and the three solutions on how to prevent the rise in the spreading of the virus within the area. According to the website Avert, studies have shown that the most effective ways to help stop the spread of AIDS includes testing centers, intervention centers, and the distribution of more protective measures.

Children who are poor are most often born into poverty. Poverty is the lack of necessary needs in order to survive. Whether this be shelter, food, or water, most comes from a lack of cash flow through the family. Other situations can be divorces, children joining or being taken by rebel forces, parents passing away, or even situations of abuse. Statistics say that, “Around 55% of people live below the poverty line, living on less than a dollar each day. Areas with the greatest number of poor are particularly in the east of the country, where conflict continues”. With the majority of poor people living in the east, this also means that healthcare is worse there. When living conditions are not sanitary and there malnutrition, this causes people to become more susceptible to menial diseases. With all these factors taken into account, “The capital, Kinshasa, contains around 20-25,000 children who sleep rough and survive by begging”. Without means to help support these starving children, the country will continue to stay in this unproductive state; there needs to be a prevention of these preventable diseases killing the

Around the world, there are an overwhelming 143 million+ orphans children either in orphanages, foster care or roaming the streets. “When you lose your parents as a child, you are indoctrinated into a club, you are taken into life's severest confidence. You are undeceived.” which is say by Hilary Thayer Hamann whom is Anthropology of an American girl(Hamann). As the orphans in this society just like a wallflower. Orphans has a huge percentage in the total population in the world.

The world as a whole should be mortified by what is happening in Sub-Saharan Africa. In places like Swaziland, Botswana, Lesotho poverty, crime and systematic corruption are the tinder for the fire that is the HIV epidemic in Africa.

Children sadly tend to suffer the most due to poverty, “1 billion children worldwide are living in poverty.” Many catch diseases, such as AIDS, before the

When visiting South Africa, I was intrigued at the beauty of the country, but was also curious as to how the country was dealing with one of Africa’s largest problems, AIDS/HIV. With the AIDS epidemic having started over 25 years ago, the disease continues to affect the population of Africa, especially South Africa, the nation with 5.6 million people living with HIV, the most in the world. Much of South Africa’s history of struggle with the virus is attributed to misinformation given by Thabo Mbeki, a former president, who “questioned the link between HIV and AIDS” and his former health minister who misled the nation with ideas that the virus could be treated with “beets and

I come from Los Angeles, a city over 7,500 miles away from Nambonkaha, yet I am not new to the African culture. Having friends and teachers from various countries within the continent such as Ghana, Namibia, Egypt, and Rwanda. I remember my first introduction to my friend, Justin, who was from Ghana. I can distinctly recall the aroma of Coco Butter, which I only learned to identify in the following weeks. Growing up with a friend who is from Ghana never seemed odd to me, other than I would rarely be able to meet his entire family. I often would catch myself thinking about the cliché thoughts, What is it like over there? Is it safe to go? Should I go when I’m older? Each of these questions proved to be a fruitless argument, cycling through my

In Sub-Saharan African area, sex worker is also at particularly increasing risk of HIV. “Average HIV prevalence among this group is an estimated 20% compared to just 3.9% globally. In fact, 17 of the top 18 countries where HIV prevalence exceeds 20% among sex workers are in sub-Saharan Africa.”(Avert.org) Secondly, Men who have sex with men is really dangerous activities to infection AIDs. Furthermore, Sub-Saharan Africa has very limited data on men who have sex with men (MSM) which mean people were not able to realize why MSM is really dangerous and keep doing this tragedy. Lastly, as parent die children tried to find destitute and homeless. “The combination of high birth rates and high AIDS mortality among adults, including many parents, has meant that more than 90 percent of children who have been orphaned as a consequence of the HIV/AIDS epidemic are in this region”(Goliber). Poverty makes society to prostitution and rapidly the cycle of HIV and

Sub-Saharan Africa is the region of the world that is most affected by HIV/AIDS. The United Nations reports that an estimated 25.4 million people are living with HIV and that approximately 3.1 million new infections occurred in 2004. To put these figures in context, more than 60 percent of the people living with the infection reside in Africa. Even these staggering figures do not quite capture the true extent and impact that this disease causes on the continent. In 1998, about 200,000 Africans died as a result of various wars taking place on the continent. In that same year, more than 2 million succumbed to HIV/AIDS (Botchwey, 2000).

Located on the east coast of Africa, Tanzania experiences high temperatures as well as high humidity year round. Year round, central Tanzania only gets around ten inches of rain. Tanzania is also located in an area called sub-Africa, which is the section of Africa located below the Sahara Desert. With a population around forty-eight million people, Tanzania is in the top fifty poorest countries in the world. Thirty-six percent of the population is below the poverty line and have a yearly income of only 280 US dollars. Tanzania is mainly an agricultural country, but most farmed products are not exported due to lack of food within the country. They harvest rice, potatoes, corn, sugar, and papayas. Unfortunately, Tanzania’s poverty comes

Africa! Lowest point below is 515 feet at lake Assal. Tallest mountain is mount Kinjaro in Tanzania standing at 19,340 feet. Second largest continent in this big blue world. Home to a population of 1,032,532,974 as 2011. Its not hard to realize why aids is a mass production on this continent. The sub-Saharan region of Africa is the most heavily affected area with AIDS and HIV than any other region in the world. According to advert.org 22.9 million people are living with HIV in this region. This statistic is two thirds of the worlds total. In 2010 around 1.2 people died of AIDS. Doing research about this topic gave startelling news theres was a battle on who discovered HIV and AIDS. Between the years of 1983, 1984, Dr. Robert Gallo and Dr. Luc Montagniers there was fued.. Montagnier graduated in medical and biological science from the university Paris. At age of 23 became the universities medical assistant, later o became employed at the Institute Curie and for almost 30 years at the Institute Pasteur in Paris. During his time at the Latter Institute he founded the Viral Oncology Research unit. This unit devoted their time and study to cancer and the oncogenic retrovirus. But without the efforts in his studies of biochemical mechanisms which are the origins of the growth in soft agar of virus transformed cultured cells, and evidence of the multiple step process in transformation of these cells based on their certain properties of growth in soft gels. This laboratory took