Your daily Selection of IRIN Africa PlusNews reports, 10/2/2006

October 2, 2006

U N I T E D N A T I O N S

Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs

Integrated Regional Information Network (IRIN) -

[These reports do not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

CONTENT:

1 - SOUTH AFRICA: HIV/AIDS and water privatisation - the human impact

JOHANNESBURG, 2 October (PLUSNEWS) - " Water, gathered and stored since the

beginning of time in layers of granite and rock, in the embrace of dams and the

ribbons of rivers - will one day, unheralded, modestly, easily and simply flow

out to every South African who turns a tap. That is my dream. "

These were the words of novelist Antjie Krog on the promulgation of South

Africa's post-apartheid national water policy in April 1997. Nine years later,

her dream has not materialised; affordable water is not reaching the poor in the

townships and informal settlements.

Commodity for the privileged

The government introduced limited free water and prepaid meters in many

municipalities as part of its cost-recovery measures in 2002, but experts and

affected residents argue that the 6,000 litres of free water per household per

month is too little to meet the most basic needs. Besides the inadequacy of free

supplies, the cost of supplementing supplies has shot up and fuelled a general

resentment of the cost-recovery measures.

" Water is now a commodity for the privileged. The 6,000 litres supplied free

often run out in 11 days for those with big families like me. After that, the

meter cuts the supply, and I have to pay more for additional water. On average,

the household can go for up to six days per month without water because we do

not have the money. We are all unemployed, " said Soames Manyathi, a resident of

Phiri in Soweto.

Manyathi said his 12-member family has adopted stringent water-conservation

measures like flushing the toilet a maximum of two times a day, sharing baths

and reusing water for washing clothes and kitchen implements. Before the arrival

of water meters in 2002, many families in Phiri had adequate supplies for a flat

rate of 110 rand (US $15) per month.

" Water has become an expensive commodity for the poor people, but it remains

cheap for the rich. It is surprising that costs that are being recovered from

the poor are used to subsidise cheaper supplies to the rich, " he said.

HIV/AIDS and special water needs

Most of the families in Phiri are big, and there is widespread unemployment and

poverty. Because of the high rate of HIV/AIDS in the community, restrictions

imposed on access to water have badly affected the provision of care for the

terminally ill. Phukubje, who cares for her ill sister, said the 590 rand

($82) foster-care grant she receives each month is insufficient to provide the

basic needs and pay for adequate water supplies.

" The free supply of water lasts only six days, but that is only if we try our

best to save it. The patient needs more water for regular bathing, and they

drink a lot per day. The grant cannot buy us enough food. Starvation is a big

problem now because it has become impossible to operate the family gardens we

depended upon for nutritional supplements, " Phukubje said.

When the water runs out, residents are forced to hire vans for up to 20 rand

($2.75) per person to bring water from wherever they can successfully beg for

it. However, the age-old tradition of community compassion has unravelled, and

many neighbours are less willing to share. According to a report entitled 'The

Struggle Against Silent Disconnections: Pre-Paid Meters and the Struggle for

Life in Phiri', relations between neighbours have deteriorated as people have

begun to steal water from each other.

According to an assessment by Desmond , a doctor and the president

of the Southern African HIV Clinicians Society, the high cost of water has

far-reaching implications on HIV/AIDS prevention and care. said water is

essential for the preparation of food to minimise the risk of intestinal

infections, to which HIV/AIDS patients are more vulnerable.

" Because PLWHA [people living with HIV/AIDS] are susceptible to frequent bouts

of diarrhoea, infected individuals require additional drinking water to avoid

dehydration. Frequent bathing is also necessary, because PLWHA are susceptible

to a variety of skin infections. Additional drinking water is necessary for

taking medicines and for making foods easier to patients suffering from mouth

ulcers or thrush, " said.

HIV/AIDS patients approaching the terminal stage often use toilets more

frequently, a situation that demands frequent flushing. said patients in

the advanced stage of illness soil their clothing and beds more frequently,

imposing the additional needs of washing the patients and the laundry regularly.

He added that the cultivation of nutrition gardens to provide a healthy diet,

which is critical for the terminally ill, depended on decent access to

sufficient and readily available water.

" In HIV/AIDS-affected households, access to additional water is not only

critical for the infected individuals, but also for caregivers and for the whole

household in order to lessen the burden of caring for the ill and to ensure that

other members do not have to forgo their basic water requirements in order to

care for those infected with HIV/AIDS, " said.

HIV/AIDS and water privatisation

According to Dale McKinley of the Coalition Against Water Privatisation,

privatisation has aggravated the suffering of HIV/AIDS patients and bred a

number of social health problems in the townships and informal settlements. " The

commodification of water also presents a serious challenge to underequipped

HIV/AIDS caregivers working under difficult conditions in the poor areas, "

commented McKinley.

He said privatisation was in conflict with the notions of water as a human

right, the provision of basic needs, and the stated goal of free basic services

for all. McKinley said the poor had become " customers " intead of being protected

by the government.

" In addition to entrenching the logic of payment for a basic resource, the

prepaid meter individualises the relationship of people to water and makes any

notion of individual right to access dependent on individual ability to pay.

Water provision has been made the responsibility of a private company, but only

to a paying individual, " he said.

Efforts to get a comment from the City of Johannesburg were fruitless, but a

report posted on its website said the installation of water meters in areas

defined as high-consumption zones would go ahead until 2007. The exercise is

part of the city's cost-recovery measures being enforced under Operation

Gcin'amanzi (Zulu for 'save water'). Soweto was targeted because it is a

high-water-consumption area.

" Total water loss in the high consumption areas is estimated at 82,000

mega-litres per annum, or 225 mega-litres per day. Approximately 83 percent of

these losses occur in Soweto. Soweto also consumes 30 percent of the water

purchased by Johannesburg Water from Rand Water and 90 percent of the water

purchased for deemed high consumption areas, so targeting Soweto for the

implementation of a Water Demand Project could yield significant savings in the

future, " the report said.

The report added that the city expected more than 160,000 households to be

covered by Operation Gcin'amanzi when it ends in 2007. The only tangible benefit

so far is that many households that were not paying for water previously are now

being billed. However, the council is yet to investigate the full impact of the

imposition of water meters on poor households.

" What requires further investigation is whether the full level of service leaves

sufficient water for health and hygiene purposes for poor households who may be

unable to pay for water consumption above the Free Basic allocation. It is not

clear whether the basic allocation of 6 kilolitres is too little, and whether

this needs to be increased to 10 or 12 kilolitres per month, " read part of the

council report.

/This article is part of a series on HIV/AIDS and communities of humanitarian

concern. Visit: www.plusnews.org/AIDSreport.asp/

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October 2, 2006