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Africa faces dual tragedy as famine and AIDS strike in tandem
UNAIDS press release Rome, 12 June 2002
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Hunger and AIDS are threatening sub-Saharan Africa on two fronts, working in tandem to endanger millions of lives and drive back development, according to the United Nations AIDS Programme.
"A dual tragedy has hit sub-Saharan Africa," said Marika Fahlen, Director of Social Mobilization and Information at the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS). "Where lack of food is greatest, HIV prevalence is alarmingly high. The two emergencies are not mutually exclusive." Ms Fahlen was addressing the World Food Summit, being held in Rome from 10-13 June.
The links between agriculture and AIDS are clear. In just two decades, AIDS has killed seven million farmers in Africa, cutting labour productivity on the continent by up to 50%. Also, the worst food shortages in a decade in Southern Africa are hitting countries with particularly high HIV prevalence.
"The two emergencies should not be handled separately," said Ms Fahlen. "In a world of AIDS, rural development, food security and agricultural policies cannot be handled in isolation from the epidemic."
UNAIDS warned that without success in HIV prevention, the goals of the 1996 World Food Summit and the Millennium Development Goals will not be met. "These goals to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger will not be reached without effective multi-sectoral HIV/AIDS programmes," said Ms Fahlen. "While UNAIDS welcomes the reference to HIV/AIDS made in this summit's draft resolution, we would like to see a forceful call to action with respect to HIV/AIDS at the World Food Summit consistent with the UN General Assembly's Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS." The Declaration was adopted unanimously by governments at the UN General Assembly Special Session on HIV/AIDS held in New York last June. The Millennium Development Goals were adopted by world leaders at the Millennium Summit in 2000.
Ms Fahlen drew attention to the vast suffering already engendered by AIDS in rural areas. "Because of AIDS, farming skills have been lost, agricultural extension services have declined, rural livelihoods have disintegrated, productive capacity to work the land has dropped, and household earnings are shrinking while the cost of caring for the ill skyrockets," she said.
Each day, close to 14,000 people become infected with HIV, most of them in their most productive years, Ms Fahlen said. "With 20 million deaths since the early 1980s and 40 million people now living with HIV or AIDS - more than half of them in sub-Saharan Africa, it is clear that the demographic pyramid as we once knew it has been redrawn." |
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