AEGiS-NV: Revitalise HIV campaign

Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2005. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.

Revitalise HIV campaign

New Vision (Kampala) - December 16, 2005

THE rate of HIV infection in the Ugandan population has stagnated at 6.5 per cent and is no longer going down. Uganda has been praised globally for bringing prevalence down from its peak of 18 per cent in the late 1980s. But has the HIV campaign in Uganda now run out of steam?

Indeed HIV infection may have started to increase slightly. Nine antenatal clinics have reported higher rates of infection although six showed some falls.

The figures from the 2005 Uganda Aids Indicator Survey mask considerable variations. The HIV rate for ethnic groups ran from 14.9% among the Batoro to 1.7% among the Karimojong while circumcised men had a prevalence rate of 3.7% compared to 5.5% for non-circumcised men. Women had slightly higher prevalence rates with pregnant women recording 6.5% and non-pregnant women 7.7%.

While these HIV figures are not disastrous, they clearly indicate that there is no room for complacency. Indeed the figures indicate that some boys are starting to have sex earlier and adults are starting to have more multiple partners.

HIV education has been confused in Uganda over the past few years by argument over which of the ABC messages should predominate: Abstinence, Be Faithful, or Condoms. But almost everyone now agrees that the three messages should be given equal weight and none should be more prominent than the other.

Government should now orchestrate a revitalised HIV campaign through all media, from billboards to radio, from posters in clinics to flyers in newspapers. The messages should be forceful and give equal weight to all parts of ABC so that Ugandans can make decisions based on their personal situations about how they deal with the HIV pandemic.

If we do not revitalise Aids awareness in the general public, there is a risk that the rate of HIV infection will actually start to rise again. And that would be a terrible shame for Uganda.

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