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We need to structure our environment to combat AIDS
Prof Rodney Harber Published in The Mail & Guardian, 17-23 May 2002
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"HIV/AIDS has to be part of every design brief and every call for tender ... practitioners cannot simply bumble along as part of denial"
About 160 000 to 200 000 people have died of AIDS-related diseases in South Africa to date, but four million are infected with HIV. The inevitable disruption by HIV/AIDS of all aspects of our society, including the built environment, will be so profound that it is virtually impossible to imagine.
The Black Death in mid-14th Century Europe is believed to have wiped out up to half of the population. Its aftermath transformed Europe. With regard to the built environment, the new shortage of skilled labour meant that, according to Philip Ziegler in The Black Death, "workmen would opt for less complicated and ambitious techniques". The prevailing style of architecture changed from the decorated to the perpendicular to compensate for fewer artisans. The workers who survived the Black Death were in a much stronger position to bargain for their services.
An exploration of the impact of the Black Death gives an insight into the variety and intensity of social trauma still likely to manifest itself in South Africa. The relentless unfolding of the HIV/AIDS pandemic will be accompanied by denial, prejudice, new values, labour redistribution and radical social change, all of which must have a profound impact on the built environment. Practitioners cannot simply bumble along as part of denial.
For a start, a building industry that is characterised by cyclical demand will be crippled as the economy dips drastically owing to absenteesim, illness and the need to retrain. Demand must drop. It has been estimated by the Building Industries Federation of South Africa that by 2010 the demand for new houses will be 152 000 less than it would have been without HIV/AIDS. As professionals, we plan, then deliver, solid structures years down the line. We must be wary about creating fossils. Building work may consist of altering existing redundant buildings, so it is incumbent on architects to design "loose-fit" buildings that can be readily adapted. A cluster of robust volumes that can be naturally ventilated is an ideal model.
Standard plans for schools that look like train carriages in the platteland are still being issued. Apart from their inappropriate design for new forms of interactive learning, perhaps classrooms should be divided by removable partitions so that educators can cover for each other owing to increasing absenteeism. More design-care must be allocated for unfit learners. And if co-educational secondary schools are really a major social problem in South Africa, including the long vulnerable journeys to and from school, drastic built-environment interventions are called for.
The housing sector is where South Africa is probably rolling out a potential disaster. The freestanding top structure in the centre of an individual site is wholly inadequate for a sick person battling for privacy. Nearly two million orphaned children in South Africa by 2010 will be the biggest challenge of all. The answer will not be in unwieldy institutions, but to reinforce the extended families that have already taken in 300 000 orphans. Co-housing, where there can be shared responsibility for survival among reconstructed families, is an extension of a traditional homestead. Perhaps housing departments should assist families to extend their existing homes so they can take in supervised orphans.
The guiding principles of housing layout need to be challenged to give rise to solutions where distances are reduced, the streets are safe and sustainability is top of the agenda. Our predicament is literally just around the corner. HIV/AIDS has to be part of every design brief and every call for tender. The only effective way to raise awaremess would be to force all built-environment professionals to formally interrogate their projects, for example:
Am I contributing to the spread of AIDS by designing vulnerable building types, for example single-sex hostels, casinos, barracks and workers' camps on remote sites?
Can my design present opportunities for the prevention of HIV/AIDS - for example: murals, counselling facilities or user-friendly spaces and facilities for affected persons?
Does my housing design support the potential for home-based care or mutual help for supervising orphans?
Is the design flexible enough to accommodate evolving changes of use?
Can I specify an on-site HIV/AIDS sympathetic environment and use of local labour to reduce migration?
Is my building robustly detailed to avoid ongoing maintenance costs?
Has every step beem taken to reduce the costs of all services?
Has the deisgn taken the ever-evolving social implications of HIV/AIDS into account?
We know that there will be light at the end of the tunnel. The trauma will inevitably end, and so we also need to design a more sustainable world for the majority that survive.
Prof Rodney Harber is a professor at the School of Architecture, Planning and Housing at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Durban
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