InterPress News Service (IPS); Tuesday, 26 March 1996.
Lewis Machipisa

Health minister Timothy Stamps says the HIV prevalence rate is close to 30 percent among the sexually active population in Zimbabwe. Although not providing the data, Stamps believes the figure is higher within the armed forces.

Unconfirmed reports of a sero-positive rate of 70 percent within one battalion which donated blood to the national transfusion services have been hotly denied by the army.

And the defence ministry's failure to leap at the initiative of random anonymous testing among new recruits has been matched by the concerns of civil liberties groups here.

"Testing for HIV would definitely be right but then the right of people to privacy is violated by such a test. The right not to be discriminated against will also be violated," says Mike Auret director of the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace (CCJP).

For Auret, it's a double bind. On one hand there is a need to protect individual rights and on the other "the army is one of the main contributors to the growth of HIV sufferers in the country."

AIDS is a full-blown disaster in Zimbabwe. There have been more than 150,000 recorded cases since 1984 and today more than 10 percent of the country's 10.4 million people are HIV carriers, according to Elizabeth Matenga, executive director of the AIDS Counselling Trust (ACT).

'The Herald', the official daily, recently reported that 42 AIDS victims die each day. Economic analysts predict that about 10 percent of the country's workforce in the formal sector will be unemployable by 1997.

According to the World Bank, about 27 percent of Zimbabwe's health budget, already shrunk by spending cuts, is swallowed by AIDS care.

Yet, this year's fiscal budget allocated the ministry of health 1.3 billion dollars (about 151 million U.S. dollars) while defence received 2 billion dollars (slightly above 200 million U.S. dollars).

But while the army acknowledges the gravity of the AIDS problem nation wide, it feels it is being unfairly singled out.

"It's not really true that soldiers are loose just because they are always on the move," says Zimbabwe National Army (ZNA) Director of Public Relations Department, Major Ncube.

"Are you saying just because soccer players are always on the move they are loose? I have even heard that journalists are loose just because they move a lot, but is it true?"

"The army tends to be much more in focus than most organisations and as result is also vulnerable to sensational reporting," Ncube observes. "The army is one big employer, employing more than 40,000 people and you cannot compare it say to an organisation that employs 1,000 people."

There is a proven link between Sexually Transmitted Diseases and increased vulnerability to HIV infection. STDs are on average two to five-times higher on military bases than in the civilian population during peace time, a US-based medical organisation studying the link between the military and AIDS reports. In times of conflict, STD prevalence can double.

"We are at peace and most soldiers are staying with their families and so really not vulnerable like say when they are away," Ncube hits back.

But according to one insurance agent from a local life insurance firm with a sizeable client list from the army, the company is staggering under the burden of AIDS-related claims.

"Some time back, the firm would just register soldiers indiscriminately under orders from top officials. Now they are paying through their noses," the agent who refused to be named said.

As one way of reducing casual sex by soldiers, Matenga of ACT -- although careful not to single out the army as a hotbed of HIV -- suggests the ministry of defence should build more quarters for married soldiers.

"Soldiers, just like long distance truck drivers are at a high risk of contracting the HIV virus because they are deployed away from their families. The temptation is high to indulge in casual sex because there is no alternative. Yes, they may use condoms, but after one too many, they tend to forget," she points out. (END/IPS/LM/oa/96)

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