Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique (Maputo)
24 June 2009
Maputo — Mozambican state employees who suffer from chronic illnesses, which make it impossible for them to continue working, will be obliged to retire early, according to a government decree approved on Tuesday.
According to the official government spokesperson, Deputy Education Minister Luis Covane, people who are incapacitated due to chronic illness will receive 30 per cent of their salary for up to two years. If at the end of that period they show no sign of recovery, and are unable to return to work, they will be compulsorily retired.
The decree covers all chronic diseases, but the problem at the forefront of the government's mind is the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Covane told reporters that, of the 167,000 workers in the public administration, about 32,000 are believed to be HIV-positive.
He said that an estimated 1,600 state employees are dying of AIDS every year. Currently about 10,000 are undergoing the life-prolonging anti-retroviral therapy.
There is no way of knowing exactly how many public servants are infected, since mandatory HIV testing is illegal.
The government's new measures, however, are a strong incentive for state employees to take the HIV test while they are still apparently healthy. If they are HIV-positive, their state of health can then be regularly monitored and, at the appropriate moment, they can be put on a course of anti-retroviral drugs.
If the infection is detected early, there is no reason why such people cannot continue working and enjoy a relatively normal life.
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