International specialists meet to discuss pandemic

  CATHERINE JUN Saidi Kapiga of Harvard
University spoke at a conference at UCLA addressing aspects of the
HIV/AIDS epidemic on the African continent.

By Trucmai Nguyen
Daily Bruin Contributor

By this time tomorrow 6,000 people will have died from AIDS in
Africa. By this day next year AIDS will have claimed more than 2.4
million lives on the African continent alone.

This staggering reality was brought to campus Friday with the
gathering of international specialists to discuss social issues,
policy and prevention of AIDS and HIV in Africa.

The day-long event sponsored by UCLA’s African Studies
Center and International Studies and Overseas Programs sought to
educate students and the greater community about the urgency and
severity of AIDS in Africa.

“We live in this global village,” said Edmond
Keller, director of the James S. Coleman African Studies Center.
“Whatever happens in Africa today might be on our doorstep
tomorrow.”

One of the issues discussed by the first panel of specialists
dealt with women and gender issues. A major problem causing women
to become more vulnerable to HIV and AIDS not only in Africa, but
in countries around the world, is their status in male dominated
cultures.

In Africa, popular belief states that having sex with a virgin
will kill the AIDS virus. Because of the lack of education, the
disease spreads quickly in countries like Zambia, where one in 12
girls under the age of 15 are infected by the virus.

“What women “¦ here would feel totally comfortable
saying no, and saying yes?” Stephanie Urdang from the United
Nations Development Fund for Women asked the audience.

She emphasized the importance of educating women to say
“No” in cultures where women are submissive to men.

United Nations statistics show that infection rates in young
African women are much higher than in young men. In some countries,
the rates for teen-age girls are five times higher than for
boys.

“It is the inability to say “˜no’ because of
the culture of women that fuels the disease,” Urdang
said.

According to specialists and activists, the primary objective of
a global response to the AIDS epidemic in Africa is the prevention
of new infections. Thus, education and communication campaigns
become the leading mechanisms for awareness and change.

The specialists addressed the need to de-stigmatize the disease
in order to bring infected patients forward to seek help and reduce
the risk of spreading the disease further.

“Obviously, stigma is a tremendous barrier for
prevention,” said Phil Wilson, director of African American
AIDS Policy and Training. “It is a barrier for people
accessing care, but also, the lack of treatment fuels stigma.

Wilson, who has been battling the disease for nearly two
decades, explained that the one mechanism for reducing stigma and
opening the community to discussion is letting people know that
there is reason to be hopeful.

The specialists agreed that vaccines and medical care exist and
can be made accessible to the African communities through global
assistance. International aid can only become available, however,
once wealthier countries acknowledge that a problem exists outside
of their own communities.

Wilson put the crisis into perspective, pointing out that the
United States has been averaging 40,000 new infections a year,
while it takes four days for that to happen in Africa.

Cynthia Davis, a professor at Charles Drew University, stressed
the importance for powerful nations like the U.S. to understand
that this crisis is a critical global issue.

“HIV and AIDS is a global pandemic,” said Davis.
“We had this myopic vision of what was happening just here in
the U.S. and for many, many years, people did not even consider
what was happening around the world.”

Davis said the epidemic in Africa is directly linked to the lack
of access to basic health care and inadequate resources. In
addition, a lack of coordinated efforts focusing on education,
prevention, and risk reduction exacerbates the situation. Most of
the panelists agreed that international aid and intervention is
essential in providing the impoverished countries of Africa with
education, basic supplies, and health care needed to combat the
disease.

According to Paul Zeitz, co-director of the Global AIDS
Alliance, international organizations like his own are focusing on
raising $15 billion per year, the projected amount necessary to
properly deal with the AIDS epidemic in Africa. Instead of loans,
which put the countries into unnecessary debt, the Global AIDS
Alliance is aiming to collect grants and donations from the public,
government and corporations.

Vickie Mays, a UCLA professor and director of Black C.A.R.E.,
the Black Community AIDS Research and Education Project, emphasized
the importance of the issue of HIV and AIDS regardless of race, age
and gender.

Mays said for a topic this globally salient, it is necessary to
make events like this one accessible to students and the local
community in order to educate them and to call upon them to take
action.

“(It is important) that our students are prepared as
citizens to understand the issues so they know how to vote as
professionals so that in their chosen profession they can make a
contribution; and then as human beings, in the sense of
understanding how to be compassionate, how to be activists “¦
to ensure that we’re all going to have a future.”