Obama angry over HIV/Aids spread in Africa

President Obama has told African governments to change the behaviour of their citizens to prevent HIV spread, saying treating patients while others are catching the virus is untenable.

“We are never going to have enough money to simply treat people who are constantly getting infected,” he said. “We’ve got to have a mechanism to stop the transmission rate.”

Mr Obama, who held a meeting with 115 young African leaders at the White House on Tuesday, blamed the upswing in new HIV/Aids infections in Africa on retrogressive culture that makes females satisfy the pleasure of men.

Women empowerment
“In Africa, empowering women is going to be critical to reducing the transmission rate because so often women, not having any control over sexual practices and their own body, end up having extremely high transmission rates,” he said.

He said US has a huge interest in public health systems in Africa because reducing HIV/Aids transmissions, will have a positive effect on HIV rates internationally, due to transmigration of diseases.

The Aids pandemic has swept through Africa to devastating effect; snatching bread-winners and skilled, productive workers while generating orphans and other dependants.

In Uganda where the infection rate was about 30 per cent in the late 1980s, a politically-led three-themed campaign – for Abstinence, Being faithful and Condom use or ABC model – helped drive down the rate to an average six per cent.

Global poster
The country became a global poster for success against HIV/Aids, attracting huge funds from the Presidential Emergency Plan for Aids Relief and Global Fund yet mixed messages, one emphasising abstinence for sexually-active citizens, have confused official response to the pandemic first causing stagnation and lately, experts say, signs of a raise in new infections.
Mr Obama said the US, the largest contributor to the global HIV/Aids purse, has not slashed its allocation as alleged by some critics but caring for people living with HIV.

The alternative, he said, is to explore workable preventive programmes; build greater public health infrastructure and institutionalise country-specific interventions as his administration increases funding under the Global Health Initiative.

In a one-hour question-and-answer session with the delegates from across Sub-Saharan Africa including two Ugandan women, Obama criticised corrupt, dictatorial leaders in Africa and challenged the youth to lead the turnaround of their communities.