African AIDS Epidemic: Made Worse by Political Correctness

Abstinence programs in Uganda and Ghana have proven successful in stemming the progression of this dreaded disease. So why do many in the United States oppose programs like this?

by Melvin Rhodes

One subject seemed to dominate U.S. President George W. Bush’s recent five-nation trip to Africa.

Although he discussed Liberia’s seemingly never-ending civil war and the constant threat of international terrorism, AIDS was the number one topic.

This partly follows the president’s initiative in donating $15 billion for AIDS in Africa, a decision you would think would be universally applauded. But in this climate of pandemic anti-Americanism, even American generosity is not appreciated.

Many cries were heard along the lines of "It’s not enough." An international AIDS conference in Paris a few days after the president’s African visit led to cries bemoaning the cost of stationing troops in Iraq when compared to the needs for more money to combat AIDS. "Just one day’s war costs would give us all we need for a whole year," said one AIDS delegate to the conference, speaking in a BBC World Service interview July 16.

That’s unlikely to be the case. The problem with AIDS is that it’s a bottomless pit.

As more and more people become HIV-positive and later develop full-blown AIDS, so the need for more drugs increases—at considerable cost. Even with the cheaper generic drugs now available in most Third World countries, the costs of treatment will only go up year by year. Added to which is the great irony of the administration’s generosity—the $15 billion will actually contribute to the spread of the virus!

How is this possible? Isn’t some of the money intended for education so that the virus will not spread so fast?

Well, yes, but—

The fact remains that the longer people with the HIV virus live, the more people they can pass it on to. If Western donors believe that education will solve this problem, they fail to understand the challenges involved when dealing with people in various cultures.

Read the full article at www.wnponline.org/wnp/wnp0308/index.htm

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