Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2000. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Mail & Guardian (Johannesburg) - November 29, 2000
Steven Swindells
Africa's biggest economy faces slower economic growth, shrinking GDP, increased household poverty and the loss of its most economically active people as HIV-Aids takes more lives in the next 20 years, health experts and economists said.
Several new studies issued by South African institutions and the United Nations ahead of World Aids Day on December 1 have pointed to crippling human losses that would impact foreign and domestic investment, cut saving rates and harm the country's skills base.
UNAids said the economy would be 17% smaller in 2010 than it would have been without Aids. By then the disease would have cost the country about $22bn.
South Africa's population and the economy were expected to be 23% smaller by 2015 as a result of Aids, Deutsche Securities in Johannesburg reported. The report showed the population levelling at 49 million from 2006.
Around 16 million South Africans would die of Aids by 2021, the Development Bank of Southern Africa said. In a report released in Johannesburg, the bank highlighted research that up to seven million could die of the disease by 2010. By 2015 some R41bn would have been wiped off GDP compared to a no-Aids scenario, the bank said.
The country's health department said that Aids had emerged as the most common cause of maternal death at all levels of care in South Africa. Of 774 maternal deaths in 1999, close to a third were due to non-pregnancy related sepsis linked to HIV.
"We lost a generation because of apartheid. We have another lost generation and even a bigger one because of Aids," said Alan Whiteside, director of the Health Economics and HIV/Aids Research Division (HEARD) at the University of Natal.
Deutsche Securities said the costs to the economy would begin to rise significantly as HIV spreads among skilled workers, leading to lower productivity, bigger claims on benefit schemes and higher replacement costs of employees.
Household consumption would change dramatically because of Aids due to lower income growth and the reallocation of spending towards healthcare.
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