Inter Press Service - February 8, 2000
Mithre J. Sandrasagra

However, the event failed to attract representatives from Western drug companies, which have come under fire for keeping AIDS medications out of the financial reach of most Africans.

The forum was organised by African Amicale and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and featured a 500,000 dollar pledge from the US cosmetics firm MAC.

It came nearly one month after the United Nations Security Council took up the problem of AIDS in Africa, the first time a health issue has been discussed before the Council.

At Monday's town hall meeting, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan spoke of reassuring advances in the fight against AIDS, such as the remarkable work of community groups and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in Africa, and the development of effective and affordable drugs which prevent mother-to-child transmission of the disease.

"The conspiracy of silence is being shattered," Annan said, referring to new policies undertaken by African governments which encourage people to speak out about the problems and realities of AIDS, which has long been stigmatised on the continent and elsewhere.

But he added that while these are all encouraging developments, they are not enough.

Annan acknowledged that AIDS was a global problem, but noted that nowhere else in the world has it reached the emergency dimensions seen in Africa, and nowhere else has it become a threat to the very foundations of society.

The president of the UN General Assembly, Theo-Ben Gurirab, said "we must aim for an international groundswell on this critical issue, similar to the grand coalition which has brought together the United Nations, the civil rights movement in the United States, the worldwide anti-apartheid campaign and the national liberation movements...in southern Africa in the 1960s and 1980s." Gurirab said that solidarity and commitment similar to that demonstrated by the international community during times of political crisis are what is now needed to combat the pandemic of AIDS.

However, one month ago was the first time African governments, United Nations agencies involved in the fight against AIDS in Africa, donor governments and agencies, and private corporations had ever sat down together to discuss the problem of AIDS in Africa.

On that occasion, Annan spelled out the individual responsibilities of this group and asked them to develop a plan of action "commensurate with the scale of the crisis" by May.

Mark Malloch Brown, head of the UNDP, said that local partnerships are usually better connected, less costly and more effective than intergovernmental dialogues, which have become cumbersome.

But he stuck by the assertion that UNDP development assistance to Africa will be 50 percent less next year than it was five years ago.

Brown conceded that although there will be more funding directed toward AIDS and debt relief, "the development needs of Africa are not being met."

To help take up the slack, Brown said that "innovative public- private partnerships are needed to guarantee markets for affordable vaccines that will encourage research and development efforts of drug companies."

African entertainer Angelique Kidjo told those present at the meeting that she believed in the power of individuals as compared to large organisations in combating the disease.

Affected individuals were more deeply touched by the consequences of the disease in their communities, and would be more effective foot soldiers in the battle against the disease.

Cynthia Eyakuze di-Domenico of African Action on AIDS (AAA) also emphasised the importance of working at the community level. She discussed her group's work with AIDS orphans, whose numbers grew by 10 million last year alone.

AAA provides educational, nutritional, and health services to more than 1,000 children in Benin, Sierra Leone, Ethiopia, Ghana, Cameroon, Uganda, Rwanda, and Zimbabwe.

Specific concerns were also brought to light at today's meeting, like the three to four times greater incidence of HIV/AIDS in young girls than boys of the same age.

Brown attributed this trend to "the extent to which young girls feel forced to have sex with older men."

"We will never solve the problem of HIV/AIDS," Brown said, "unless issues such as this one are addressed."

Lack of a coordinated effort locally and internationally, poor services, weak government, economic failure, and a fear to speak up about the disease - which has been called a "conspiracy of silence" - have facilitated transmission of this disease by denying communities the knowledge and other means to protect themselves.

Other speakers at the meeting included US Ambassador Richard Holbrooke; the actor Danny Glover, who is a UN goodwill ambassador; John Dempsey of MAC Cosmetics; Gabriel Rugalema, a researcher at Wageningen University and Research Centre in the Netherlands; and Eunice Morgan, a client of the African Services Committee. (END/IPS/HE/mjs/ks/00).
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