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Contributions from
the Column
Monitor
No universal blueprint
Growing support for
taxing airline tickets
Avian flu lessons from Europe
“Alternative development”
often stops short
Wolrd Bank proposes active
poverty reduction
Zimbabwean success in
fighting HIV/AIDS
Nature conservation fund for
the South Caucasus
German development budget
expected to rise in 2006
DAC publishes
Annual Report 2005
Wold Food Programme buys
drought insurance for Ethiopia
04/2006
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Zimbabwean success in fighting HIV/AIDS
Since the year 2000, the proportion of people infected with HIV in Zimbabwe has decreased dramatically.
This finding stems from research conducted by the Imperial College London, the results of which were published
in the journal Science in February. The spread of HIV among 15 to 24 year old women in the east of the country
is said to have declined by 49% and among 17 to 29 year old men by 23%. Overall, prevalence has decreased
from 23% to 20.5%. On behalf of UNAIDS, the team of scientists took blood samples and conducted interviews
in the province of Manicaland between 1998 and 2000 and compared these with more recent data from 2003.
According to the study, the fundamental cause for the decline is a change in sexual behaviour. The researchers maintain,
for example, that the number of younger women between 15 and 17 who report having had sex has more than halved
from 21% to nine percent. In the category of 17 to 19 year old men, the ratio shrunk from 45% to 27%. The proportion
of men and women who frequently changed sexual partners also fell significantly by 49% and 22% respectively. The fear
of AIDS, effective awareness raising by Zimbabwean agencies and the population’s relatively high level of education have
contributed to the change, according to the British researchers.
This success is also remarkable because Zimbabwe has received considerably less international support in the fight
against AIDS than other countries in recent years. According to the information service Africa Renewal, in 2004
Zambia received approximately $187 of development as-sistance for every citizen infected with HIV. The comparative
figure for the regime of Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe, which is ostracised by donors, was only of four dollars.
(ell)
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