HIV/AIDS and poverty - major challenges

A wide range of delegates, from government officials to community activists, packed the ICASA session on "HIV/AIDS and Poverty" on Tuesday (23 September 2003), all looking for answers to the dilemma of how poverty and HIV/AIDS are driving each other.

Anne Githuku from the UNDP said a reconceptualisation of current responses was urgently needed. Poverty was defined as the inability of individuals and households to attain a sufficient standard of living through access to assets and income. She stressed that poverty and HIV/AIDS should not be seen as homogeneous, as both are experienced in different ways through disparities in income, employment opportunities and the urban/rural divide. HIV/AIDS and poverty were linked to gender, as higher infection rates exacerbated the already vulnerable economic position of women, creating deepening levels of poverty.

At the household level, savings and incomes were depleted as money was increasingly diverted to nutrition and health care. Money for education becomes scarce and girl-children are more likely to be kept home to care for the sick. This diminishes their chances of any steady income and puts them in a position where they is more likely to engage in high-risk behaviour. So, young women are caught in a vicious downward spiral wherein HIV/AIDS and poverty are inextricably linked.

Ms Githuku stressed the urgent need for new policy and implementation responses with HIV/AIDS as part of the planning process. Beyond the dominant biomedical approach, this response needs to focus on the individual and the drivers of epidemic and infections.

There is a complex web of mutually impacting forces in HIV/AIDS that demands a different response in planning and implementation: in education (teacher deaths and orphans), in housing (forecasting needs and special housing for orphans/child-headed households), in social services (disability grants and foster-care provision. Policy-makers, international agencies and civil society organisations need to recognise and adjust to the HIV/AIDS environment. Establishing and implementing poverty reduction and job creation strategies are likely to result in successful avenues for reducing the vulnerability of the infected and the affected.

The last presentation was an impassioned input from Dr Tumwesigye, a Member of Parliament in Uganda and the Chairperson of the newly established Standing Committee on HIV/AIDS in the Ugandan government. He said that HIV/AIDS is having a worsening effect on poverty, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa, and he noted the tragic affect on women and infected infants.

Tumwesigye pointed out that people are dying because of poverty, not because there are no solutions. This requires special planning, particularly in light of the challenges presented by orphans and young girls vulnerable to sexual risk. He maintained that poverty was the primary cause of the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa, which, when combined with poor governance and a lack of clear political commitment, inadequate health infrastructur, and high illiteracy levels, was a recipe for disaster. In many countries, this situation was compounded by retrograde legal and cultural frameworks for inheritance and succession.

He concluded that, even though the cost of care, support and mitigation are rising, governments need to plan and act in ways that curb the spread of the disease, rather that trying to wish it away.

HDN Key Correspondent Team

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Republished courtesy of AF-AIDS eForum 2003:
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