Your daily Selection of IRIN Africa PlusNews reports, 3/4/2005

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CONTENT:

1 - AFRICA: AIDS death toll could reach 80 million by 2025, says new

report

2 - CHAD: HIV free certificates on sale to woo girls and get loans

1 - AFRICA: AIDS death toll could reach 80 million by 2025, says new

report

ADDIS ABABA, 4 March (PLUSNEWS) - More than 80 million people living in

Africa could die from AIDS by 2025 unless concerted actions are taken that

could save some of these lives, a new report by UNAIDS said on Friday.

Entitled, " AIDS in Africa: Three scenarios to 2025 " , the report paints a

bleak picture of the impact of HIV on the continent. It gives a detailed

glimpse into the epidemic over a 20-year period and outlines three

different scenarios.

According to the report, the worst of the epidemic is still to come. It

says there is no magic bullet solution and there is a danger of AIDS

fatigue, meaning the momentum to fight the epidemic could wane. Women, it

adds, were increasingly bearing the brunt of the epidemic.

" There is no single policy prescription that will change the outcome of

the epidemic, " the report, due to be launched in Addis Ababa on Friday by

UNAIDS head Piot, states. " The death toll will continue to rise no

matter what is done.

" Above all, these scenarios tell us that while on the one hand, any action

is already too late for the millions who have died from AIDS, on the other

hand, there is still time to change the future for many, many millions

more, " it adds.

Even with massive funding and better treatment the number of people in

Africa who are going to die from AIDS is likely to top 67 million in the

near future, the report said.

UNAIDS estimates that nearly US $200 billion is needed to save 16 million

people from death and 43 million people from becoming infected. It did,

however, stress that the lessons of the past 20 years were crucial for

curbing the spread of HIV/AIDS over the next 20, saying major inroads

could be made if the will was there.

" What we do today will change the future, " urges the report, drawn up by

leading experts and people living with HIV. " These scenarios demonstrate

that, while societies will have to deal with AIDS for some time to come,

the extent of the epidemic's impact will depend on the responses and

investment now. "

It added: " If by 2025 millions of African people are still becoming

infected with HIV each year, these scenarios suggest that it will not be

because there was no choice. It will be because, collectively, there was

insufficient political will to change behaviour at all levels from the

institution, to the community, to the individual and halt the forces

driving the AIDS epidemic in Africa. "

UNAIDS pointed out five " critical and uncertain forces " , which it said

were driving HIV/AIDS in Africa. First was the disintegration of society

and community. Second were the beliefs about how HIV is spread and how it

can be prevented. Next, mobilising resources - not just funding but

increased coordination, using new knowledge about the virus and its

spread. Finally, UNAIDS listed the importance of power in society and

whether it is centralised or shared, and the importance of gender and age.

At the moment, UNAIDS added, 25 million people were infected and life

expectancy in nine African countries has dropped below 40. There were 11

million orphans, while 6,500 people were dying each day. In 2004, some 3.1

million people were newly infected.

The three scenarios spell out a best-case situation, a mid-case and a

current-case scenario drawn out over two decades.

The first scenario involves a substantial and sustained increase in

funding to $195 billion. According to UNAIDS, under this plan, trade rules

will improve, aid flows will double and HIV/AIDS specific funding

increasing nine percent year on year - with spending reaching $10 billion

per year by 2014.

By 2019, spending can begin to decline as the number of people living with

HIV/AIDS begins, for the first time since the emergence of the virus in

the 1980s, to fall.

The second scenario sees African leaders take a stand, where HIV/AIDS is

tackled as part of a medium- and long-term strategy, regardless of

fluctuating aid or economic growth. UNAIDS estimated that under this

scenario, 75 million people will have died from AIDS by 2025, while 65

million will be infected. Some $98 billion under this situation would help

avert 24 million new infections.

Under the worst-case scenario, experts have plotted current anti-HIV/AIDS

policies and funding over the next two decades and conclude that the

epidemic will still present a " clear and present danger " . They see a

future where poverty further depletes capacity to fight AIDS, leaders go

for quick results to meet quotas rather than long term change, divisions

and stigma in society, and aid dependency and Africa failing to benefit

from trade rounds or foreign investment exacerbate the crisis.

The death toll - equal to one in ten of Africa's current population - will

leap fourfold, while infections could soar from the current 25 million,

UNAIDS added. It estimates there will be 83 million cumulative deaths, 89

million infections, and the cost of fighting HIV/AIDS will be around $70

billion.

The report can be accessed on the UNAIDS website: www.unaids.org

[ENDS]

2 - CHAD: HIV free certificates on sale to woo girls and get loans

NDJAMENA, 3 April (PLUSNEWS) - Chadian men wanting to chat up the girls or

boost their credit rating are turning to fake certificates to prove they

are not HIV-positive, to improve their chances with potential partners and

private moneylenders.

, a teacher in a secondary school in Chad's capital N'djamena, has

done just that. Last month he got a phoney certificate showing he was

HIV-negative without even stepping foot inside a testing centre.

" I use it to seduce women and buy goods at the shop on credit while I'm

waiting for the end of the month, " told PlusNews, saying he got the

precious pass from a relative who works at a testing centre. " When they

see this, people trust me. "

, a mechanic, also shelled out money to buy an HIV-free certificate.

He paid 20,000 CFA (US $40) for a piece of paper to prove he was

HIV-negative, even though testing is now free in Chad.

Last December, the government abolished the $40 charge for an HIV test to

make the service more accessible in a country where the average inhabitant

lives on less than $21 a month.

" On 1 December 2002, which was Chad's national day, a friend told me he

would get me a certificate showing I was HIV-negative if I gave him 20,000

CFA, " told PlusNews, as he repaired cars in his garage in the dusty

Chadian capital.

" That friend told me the certificate would allow me to find a job, to buy

on credit and to chat girls up, " he added.

and represent isolated cases of such trickery, according to the

coordinator of Chad's National Programme to Fight AIDS (PNLS), Donato

Koyalta.

" These cases of abuse are not the norm, " Koyalta told PlusNews.

But he admitted that there were certain situations when people were now

required to prove their HIV-status. " For instance, some families demand

that their children be HIV-tested before getting married, " Koyalta said.

" Of course, a few people might be tempted to bypass the tests, " he added.

The first HIV-certificate fraud case came to light in 2000. A young

Chadian girl who had tested HIV-positive managed to marry her French

fiancé after showing him the results of a fake test that she had got in

Chad which showed her free of the virus. Her husband found out the truth

after she was re-tested in France.

According to Koyalta, neither the scientific reliability of the HIV tests,

nor the competence of the state-trained health workers performing them

could be called into question. But he acknowledged that the delivery of

certificates is not subject to any external control.

<b>WANT A LOAN? HAVE THE VIRUS?</b>

" Men are men, " said Koyalta. " Given the poverty and the way salaries are

paid irregularly, ethical problems are affecting more and more

professions. "

Although officially an HIV test is not required for any legal procedure in

this mainly desert country of eight million people, showing a certificate

showing you are HIV-negative can open doors. And a test showing that you

have the virus can shut them.

One private money lender interviewed in the Moursal neighbourhood of the

capital said she demanded proof from all her clients that they were not

HIV-positive before advancing them cash. The woman said that if her client

died there was no way she could recoup the money from his family, because

usury is illegal in Chad. Several of her borrowers had died of AIDS, she

added.

Ever since voluntary testing was launched in Chad in 1999, more and more

people have been dropping into the screening centres to get themselves

tested.

" At the beginning, we received one or two people a day " , said Denis

Tatola, who works at the Al Nadjma centre and is living with the virus

himself. " The majority of people used to be expatriates, " he added. " Now

we receive an average of seven people a day a centre of all

nationalities. "

There are currently 38 voluntary testing centres across Chad. Eventually,

the PNLS plans to set up a testing centre in each of the 54 health

districts nationwide.

" An estimated 5,000 people were screened in 2004, 3,000 of which were in

N'djamena, " Michel Laoumaye, who works at a testing centre in one of the

capital's hospitals, told PlusNews.

" In addition, other patients who came in for other consultations in the

hospitals were screened without their knowledge to establish national

statistics, " he explained.

UNAIDS estimates that Chad's HIV prevalence rate stood at 4.8 percent of

the adult population at the end of 2003.

Health workers and AIDS activists attribute the higher volume of traffic

at HIV-testing centres to an increase in the PNLS public information and

awareness campaigns.

The price cuts of antiretroviral treatment to 5,000 CFA ($10) a month,

announced by president Idriss Deby last December, have also helped. So too

have efforts to provide psychological and social care to HIV-positive

Chadians.

However, flashing proof that you are not HIV-positive still brings

definite advantages.

" In N'djamena, people who are HIV-negative walk around with the results of

their test in their pocket or bag, " explained one Chadian journalist.

" They do not hesitate to brandish them to win people's confidence, as

people are suspicious of AIDS.

[ENDS]

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