Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2006. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Integrated Regional Information Networks - December 1, 2006
JOHANNESBURG, 1 December (PLUSNEWS) - HIV/AIDS continues to wreak havoc in South Africa, with the nation's youth appearing to be hardest hit, researchers said on 1 December, World AIDS Day.
The nation's 15-year-olds now had a 56 percent chance of dying before the age of 60, compared to a 29 percent chance of dying of an AIDS-related illness in 1990, according to 'The Demographic Impact of HIV/AIDS in South Africa: National and Provincial Indicators for 2006', a joint study issued every two years by the Actuarial Society of South Africa (ASSA) and the Medical Research Council (MRC).
Leigh Johnson, a senior ASSA researcher, warned that the youth were facing a bleak future, and much still had to be done to protect and support this vulnerable group. "Even with current youth-directed prevention campaigns being rolled out, approximately 250,000 of all new infection this past year occurred among the 15 to 24 age group," he told IRIN/PlusNews.
Overall, in 2006 there were 950 AIDS-related deaths per day in South Africa, and approximately 1,400 new HIV infections daily - a total of 530,000 new infections per year. Johnson said there was an urgent need to strengthen existing efforts to respond to the epidemic.
The government's anti-AIDS strategy, often at the centre of international criticism for its snail-paced approach to tackling the pandemic, has been revamped, with the Health Department emphasising that the key to success in the fight against AIDS was reducing the number of new infections among young people, while promoting delayed initiation of sex among youth aged 14 to 17 years.
Doctor Francois Venter, an HIV specialist at the University of Witwatersrand, in Johannesburg, warned that abstinence and delayed sexual debut might not be the most effective approaches to addressing the needs of adolescents.
"The greatest challenge is to develop new strategies for preventing HIV transmission, not just among youths but the population in general, and what is needed is for us [government and civil society]: to all go back to the drawing board on our current approaches," Venter said.
ASSA suggested that high rates of AIDS mortality would persist in South Africa for at least the next decade, although projections were sensitive to assumptions regarding future access to antiretroviral (ARV) treatment. "That's why it is vital for the government to rapidly expand its ARV rollout programme to reach all people in need of immediate treatment," Johnson added.
A further challenge would be the provision of care and support to growing numbers of orphans, expected to double between 2006 and 2015 to an estimated 2.5 million children.
Venter and Johnson agreed that the recent reformation of the South African National AIDS Council and the restored spirit of co-operation between government and civil society would go a long way to addressing the points of concern highlighted in the report.
Access the full report at any of the following sites:
www.assa.org.za
www.commerce.uct.ac.za
www.mrc.ac.za
061201
IR061202
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