Elizabeth Mwai
29 January 2008
Nairobi — About 1,000 people in Nairobi have been infected with HIV since post-election violence broke out.
Crime Scene Investigation (CSI) says 950 new infections occurred in the capital city's slums in two weeks.
CSI Chief Executive Officer, Mr Murigi Kinyanjui, on Monday said more than 500 women have been raped, 95 per cent in gang rapes with an average of three participants.
Using the 1994 Rwanda Genocide Model, Kinyanjui said, more than 90 per cent of the dominant partners had HIV/Aids.
"Estimating that the dominant participant initiated the rape and all were spontaneous, implying that no protection was used, then the subsequent participants contracted the deadly virus," he said.
Nationally, more than 1,200 women have been raped in the ongoing post-election skirmishes.
Speaking on the telephone, Kinyanjui said the situation was more complex because a number of women also had the virus at the time of the rape.
He attributed the statistics to the geography, saying mass rape mostly occurred in the slums where HIV prevalence is high.
Kinyanjui said research had shown that 85 per cent of those who participated in the mass rape incidences would eventually succumb to Aids in eight years if they did not seek treatment and stop engaging in unprotected sex.
He said studies had shown that rapists had a tendency to endanger their victims and themselves.
"If this is the case, it means that rapists will die from Aids-related complications in three years," Kinyanjui said.
He added that figures for new HIV infections in Mombasa, the Rift Valley and Kisumu would be released soon once the data had been compiled.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2008 The East African Standard. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
