Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2008. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
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New Vision (Kampala) - October 27, 2008
Irene Nabusoba
Ssekandi said the availability of antiretroviral drugs had led to complacency, as people no longer viewed AIDS as an 'immediate death sentence'.
"Experts believe that complacency and the normalisation of AIDS is leading to an increase in the risky behaviour that early prevention campaigns sought to reverse. As parliamentarians, we should advocate for positive behaviour change," Ssekandi said.
He was speaking at a three-day Great Lakes regional parliamentary conference at Munyonyo Country Resort in Kampala.
The meeting was attended by MPs from the Great Lakes region, the East African Legislative Assembly, European parliamentarians and experts on HIV/AIDS.
Ssekandi said AIDS had killed approximately one million people and reduced life expectancy to below 50 years in the country.
He said the disease had also depleted the country's labour force, reduced agricultural output and food security.
It is estimated that more than 15 million children under 18 years in the world have been orphaned as a result of the disease. More than 12 million of these children live in the sub-Saharan Africa.
In Uganda, about 1.1 million people are living with HIV and 1.2 million children have been orphaned as a result of the disease.
Only 130,000 patients, including 10,000 children, are receiving antiretroviral drugs. This is about 42% of the total number of people in urgent need of treatment.
"If not checked, these numbers will double in the next 10 years. We need to take a serious look at infection trends and behaviour to identify why this rise is occurring," Ssekandi said.
The director of the Uganda AIDS Commission, Dr Kihumuro Apuli, said: "For the last three to four years, there are over 130,000 new infections every year."
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