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HIV/AIDS takes its toll on South African teachers
Beauregard Tromp and Edwin Naidu. 04 October 2003. The Sunday Independent. Republished courtesy of Independent Newspapers (Pty) Ltd.
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Thousands of teachers in southern Africa are dying of HIV/AIDS-related illnesses as relief agencies battle to get support from the international community to help combat "the greatest humanitarian crisis in the history of mankind", according to United Nations agencies.
About 30 million people in sub-Saharan Africa have been infected with HIV, leaving 11 million children orphaned, many of whom head households and have to look after younger siblings. The number of children orphaned by HIV/AIDS is expected to rise to 20 million by 2010.
"Last year in Zambia they lost 2 000 teachers to AIDS," said James Morris, the UN Secretary-General's Special Envoy for Humanitarian needs in Southern Africa, in Johannesburg on Friday.
South African teachers are also being ravaged by the disease. "We are facing a disaster. Our membership has dropped from 220 000 to under 215 000, and many of our members have died as a result of AIDS-related illnesses," said Willy Madisha, President of the South African Democratic Teachers' Union.
Madisha said union affiliates throughout southern Africa indicated they were facing similar crises as teachers succumbed to HIV/AIDS.
"We know they're also affected. It is an extremely serious situation as teachers are a microcosm of society and what is happening in the profession is a reflection of society," he said. Madisha said the government should embark on a speedy roll-out of medicines to those who needed them urgently. "There should be no further delay," he said.
The National Professional Teachers Organisation of South Africa said educators were dying at an "alarming rate". "Millions of our people contract this dreaded disease through ignorance. We, therefore, as members of the teaching profession, must hang our heads in shame if people die because they lack the knowledge which means the difference between life and death for them," the Association said. A study in KwaZulu-Natal by the Health Economics and Research Division (HEARD) at the University of KwaZulu-Natal found that a high number of teachers were leaving the profession in the province because of HIV/AIDS.
The study found that AIDS deaths followed a long period of illness, accompanied by depression and trauma, usually while educators were still in service, directly affecting learning and teaching. The total loss of teaching-time, quality, continuity and experience also had important implications for teaching and learning that would be harder to monitor and measure, the report said.
The rise in deaths, estimated at 600 in 2000, caused by illness in the 30 to 49-year-old age grou, should be of particular concern to the education sector, and could be associated with HIV/AIDS-related infections, the study suggested.
"Simple arithmetic tells us that we cannot produce sufficient numbers of new educators in time to replace those likely to be lost to the system, if we continue to train students for a full four years," said the report.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation (WHO) warns that HIV continues to spread, causing more than 14 000 new infections every day. Ninety-five percent of these are in the developing world. The organisation said HIV/AIDS is the leading cause of death in Africa, and the fourth worldwide.
"The greatest challenge facing us now is the challenge of HIV/AIDS. In the African region, more than 30 million people are HIV-positive. People are dying every day. They urgently need treatment," said Dr Lee Jong-wook, the WHO Director-General.
He said treatment must be offered as part of a strategy which includes prevention and care and that the WHO had embarked on a plan to provide 3 million people living with HIV/AIDS with anti-retroviral medicines by the end of 2005.
Speaking recently in New York, Jong-wook said the failure to deliver HIV/AIDS medicines was "a global health emergency".
"We have the medicines to treat people for a dollar a day or less but these medicines are not getting to the people who need them." He said about 6 million people in developing countries had HIV infections that required anti-retroviral treatment. "But fewer than 300 000 are being treated. In sub-Saharan Africa, where most of the people in need of treatment live, only 50 000 people are receiving it."
"To deliver anti-retroviral treatment to the millions who need it, we must change the way we think and change the way we act. Business as usual will not work. Business as usual means watching thousands of people die every single day," he said.
The pandemic has exacerbated the food crisis in the region. UN agencies have jointly asked for $530-million (about R3,7 billion), of which $310-million is destined for food relief and $220-million for non-food activities.
The number of those facing starvation in the region has dropped from 13 million at the beginning of this year to 6,5 million people in Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe. However, donors have so far contributed just 20 percent of the required funds, leaving a shortfall of $423-million. The appeal for non-food items has raised only $9,5-million or 4,3 percent of overall needs. The non-food items are for water and sanitation, agriculture, education and health projects.
The impact of such programmes, along with an improved agricultural season, has had a massive positive impact on food and health problems in the region. Morris said people with HIV/AIDS were more susceptible to disease and therefore required a higher calorie intake. |
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