Abuja, Nigeria — Africans who wish to see an end to the devastation caused by HIV/AIDS must unite to fight the disease now, speakers said here Tuesday at the start of a four-day conference on this and related diseases.
"We must all join hands now and implement vigorously all strategies for preventing infection of the disease in order to mitigate its catastrophic impact on our societies," Atiku Abubakar, Nigeria's Vice-President, said in his keynote address at the opening of the summit.
Organised by the Organisation of African Unity in collaboration with United Nations agencies, the African Summit on HIV/AIDS, TB and other Related Infectious Diseases aims to formulate an action plan by African nations.
Besides HIV/AIDS, the twin diseases of malaria and tuberculosis are also ravaging the continent. Alphonsus Nwosu, Nigeria's Minister of Health, captured the degree of the danger posed by the marauding killer. "HIV/AIDS threatens to spare no one in Africa," the minister said in an opening address.
While the issue of denial - people's reluctance to admit its existence had in the past delayed early response to the problem - Nwosu said the reality is "too obvious to be ignored." Using Nigeria's case, he illustrated how rapidly the disease has spread across the continent. The rate of infection in the country, according to the minister, rose from one percent in 1991 to 3.5 percent in 1993. By 1995 the infection rate was 4.5 percent, and four years later, it crossed the "critical number" of five percent to 5.4 percent.
In 1999, he said, Nigeria had 2.9 million AIDS cases, which represents eight percent of the world's total AIDS cases. Nigeria's situation mirrors that of the rest of Africa. With 10 percent of the world's population, Africa accounts for 70 percent of world's total AIDS cases. More disturbing, said the minister, is not just that the figures are high, but that they are growing.
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Other speakers at the opening session included Dr. Salim A. Salim, the Secretary General of the OAU and Miss Yinka Jegede, a 22-year-old Nigerian nursing student, who is living with AIDS.
Salim said Africa's experience with the HIV/AIDS scourge had reached a "critical point," and stressed that the Abuja summit must be one with a difference. "All our energies and resources must be mobilised, " he said.
Miss Jegede, speaking on behalf of People Living with HIV/AIDS, said society's attitude should change. "Our rights must be recognized in full," she said. She also said that governments should give people with the disease leadership roles in national policymaking.
The opening session also featured a drama presentation that showed a host of dead AIDS victims from a village. As the dead moved on the street, a horde of mourners followed, wailing and recounting the number they buried yesterday. And while the toll continues, the villages, and farmlands are left desolate. Only children are left.
"Hello, children. Where are your parents?" a returnee asks. The answer comes: "They are all dead."
