|
|
Site Map . Contact . Help . Home |
|
||
|
||
| Regional Programmes . Productions . Resources . About Us | ||
Nigeria is at the brink of a huge AIDS epidemic. For years, successive military regimes promoted an attitude of denial and claimed that there was no serious HIV/AIDS problem in the country. Now under a democratic dispensation, the word is getting out. A recent survey released to coincide with the last World AIDS Day on December 1, 1999 indicates that HIV is spreading at the rate of one person per minute in Nigeria, and that over 25, 000 have been killed by the disease. According to the country's Minister of Health, Timothy Menekaya, the survey has now shown that: "HIV-Aids is as much a city problem as it is a problem for small towns and villages. Indeed no part of [Nigeria] is unaffected." Experts and health officials hold government in deep suspicion. By the end of December this year, more than half a million new infections will be recorded said the minister, acknowledging that the disease "is known to thrive on ignorance and apathy both at the private and official level". How will the government to this crisis in a way that experts and health officials will have confidence in the system? For instance, lack of infrastructure remains a biting challenge in the war on AIDS. Thus, while 115 HIV testing/screening centres were established across the country in 1987, in less than 5 years, today only a handful are still open albeit in a fitful state. Menakaya, however, deflected criticisms that the government is insincere about its commitment pledging more official assistance. He said the 1999 supplementary budget by the government of Olusegun Obasanjo "exceeds the total budgetary allocation to AIDS control in 1996, 1997 and 1998". If Menakaya is right about his budgetary claims then some answers are pending on the status of the N730 million the former Head of State, Gen. Abdulsalam Abubakar gave in 1998 "to the management and control of HIV/AIDS". Abubakar told the annual conference of thePharmaceutical Society of Nigeria (PSN) in Kano early November 1998 that the Federal Government planned to injected some N730 million into it AIDS funding plan. The Petroleum Trust Fund (PTF) was to contribute N700 million while the government made a direct extra-budgetary allocation for the balance of N30 million. The truth is that past budgetary allocations always vanish into the cesspool of Nigerian official corruption. This time around, "The present administration has identified the effective control of HIV/AIDS as one of the major priority health problems to be addressed," Menakaya said. The 1999 survey presents grim statistics that place the national average of HIV infection at 5,4%, up from a 1990 average of 1,8%. Only Cameroon, Nigeria's neighbor to the east, has a slightly higher figure of 5,5% prevalence rate. The HIV infection rate in Nigeria's other neighbors; Benin currently stands at 2,8%, Chad 2,7% and Niger 2,0%, respectively. HIV prevalence in pregnant women ranged from 0,5% to 21%, with an average prevalence of 5,4%. In 300 samples collected in each of the two sites chosen in Nigeria's 36 states and the Federal capital Abuja, the north central zone, in which Abuja is situated, recorded the worst HIV prevalence average rate of 7%. Garki, a suburb of Abuja, recorded 8%. The northwest has the lowest prevalence of 3,2%. In Lagos, the country's commercial capital and home to several red light districts, with a population of about 10-million, the average prevalence is 6,7%. The survey says women in their 20s have the highest rate of HIV infection. "HIV prevalence in the 20-24 age group ranged from 4,2% in the south-west zone to 9,7% in the north central zone." Young adults, aged between 15-19, are similarly affected, with HIV prevalence ranging from 2,8% in the northeast zone to 8,4% in the north central zone. Based on the 1999 survey, it is estimated that currently 5,8-million adult Nigerians aged 15-49 years are infected and at that current level of infection, 1 in every 20 Nigerian adult carries the HIV virus. In 10 years from now, the fatality from the disease will surpass the total deaths from the 1967-70 Nigerian Civil War where more than 2 million people where killed. [Source: Nigerian media; IPS]
The government of President Olusegun Obasanjo has responded to the problem through a cocktail of emergency policy mix costing N100 Million [$1 million] and expected to run through two years, 2000-2002. The strategy will focus on three principal issues:
To implement the strategy is a two-tier committee: A] The HIV/AIDS Presidential Action Committee: The Committee, chaired by President Olusegun Obasanjo, with Vice-President Abubakar Atiku as deputy chairman, has the ministers of Health, Education, Information, Defense, Culture, Women Affairs and Youth Development as well as the Secretary to the Government of the Federation as members. B] A 13-Man Working Committee: The Committee is to be headed by the respected physician, Professor (Mrs.) Ibironke Akinsete. Other members of the Working Committee include Dr. Mohammed Sani Gwarzo, the national co-ordinator of HIV/AIDS campaign; Dr. C. Lar; Dr. Jordan Lamajo Bako; Dr. Udoh; Senator Hairat Abdul Razak-Gwadabe; Mrs. Eulir Ajayi; and a director each from the federal ministries of Education, Information, Women Affairs, Culture, Tourism, Defence and the Director of Army in the same ministry. The Working Committee reports to the Presidential Action Committee. Believing that the global environment is crucial in the ultimate solution of this problem, the Nigerian government also asked its Ambassador to the United Nations, Arthur Mbanefo, to lobby the Security Council to accord HIV/AIDS the same concern and response as conflicts. Thus on 10 January at the Security Council, in New York, Nigeria called on the United Nations to accord the issue of HIV/AIDS epidemic the status of international security, like armed conflicts. Making the call, Mbanefo, in his remarks entitled: The Situation In Africa- the impact of AIDS and security, called for urgent national and international action to find solutions and work towards eradicating the global scourge. The Nigerian government is also targeting the youth sector where it hopes to inaugurate a vigorous youth education program. Menakaya said the National Council on Education has approved an initiative to develop instructional materials for primary and secondary schools on HIV/AIDS education. The federal ministries of health, and of education as well as the Nigerian Education Research Council, (NERC) are collaborating on this initiative. Menakaya says this initiative will ultimately lead to the integration of HIV/AIDS education into the school curriculum at all levels. At the regional level the re sponse has been slow but two states, Lagos and Benue are not taking the issue lightly. The Lagos State initiative called the HIV/AIDS Foundation, has six members and consists of three organs: The Lagos State HIV/AIDS Trust Fund; The Lagos State HIV/AIDS Executive Council and the Lagos State HIV/AIDS prevention and management committee. The Foundation has the renowned health administrator and former health minister, Professor Olikoye Ransome-Kuti, as chairman. Other members of the Lagos State HIV/AIDS Foundation are Dr. Lekan Pitan; the State health commissioner; Dr. Jide Idris; Professor Ibironke Akinsete who heads the 13-man national working committee; Otunba Solomon Oladun; Dr. Michael Ogungbesan; Mrs. Olufunmilayo Olatunji; as well as the chairman of the House Committees on Health, Dr. Olawale Ahmed. Governor Bola Tinubu who inaugurated the committee said this is put in place to curtail the spread of the disease; promote public awareness about HIV/AIDS; work towards effective management, prevention and control of the disease; and serve as a resource group of experts on HIV/AIDS. He also announced that the state has set aside N5 million for the take-off of the Anti-Retroviral Drug Revolving Scheme meant to reduce cost of treatment by people living with the disease. Tinubu called for greater partnership between the government, the private sector and the NGO sector in fight against HIV/AIDS. In Benue State, which has the highest prevalence rate in the country, Governor Akume has initiated a meeting with controversial physician, Dr. Abalaka who says he has a cure for AIDS. Akume has not given any details of his meeting with the doctor who once said mosquitoes could transmit the HIV virus. Experts dismiss this thesis saying the virus cannot survive inside insects. Government watchers in Benue State believe the state may set up a center where Abalaka will assist with treatment. Nigeria has about 14 Non-governmental organizations that are active in the public education arena. There is one reporters network devoted to AIDS education and one journalism institute with a training curriculum on how media people can handle AIDS education and advocacy through the media. Media and NGO concerns have so far focussed on exhibitions and talks at bus stops and parks in major cities to highlight the scourge of the killer disease, calling for attitudinal change.
The first victim of HIV/AIDS to be discovered in Nigeria was in 1986 but Fela Anikulapo Kuti, the master entertainer and Afro beat legend, was the most famous person to be killed by the disease. He died 2 August 1997 after a 2-year battle with AIDS. Fela, an iconoclastic artist and reformer, helped to expand the frontiers of democratic dialog through his music. He suffered endless harassment and was a constant target of state terrorism. He built a large tribe of fans and social rebels. The philosophy that united them centered on the view that the managers of the post-colonial state in Africa are robbers, metropolitan clients and culturally perverted souls. In return, the class never spared him. Fela also reveled in superstition and marijuana, which he publicly smoked against the law. He called it "African grass". In 1998 alone, the country has recorded 571,036 cases making Nigeria the 27th most critical case- country in the world, contributing 8.9% of global infection and 12.5% of the African HIV burden. Fela's struggle with the disease provides perhaps the most telling metaphor of the tragic reality of AIDS till date, yet its pedagogic value has not been used to good measure in the campaign against the disease in the country. He married about 40 wives and had a lax view of sex. When he started falling ill, he stubbornly refused medical attention until it was too late. He dismissed medical sciences as a western game and would even humor his two brothers who are physicians. When his brother, Professor Olikoye Ransome-Kuti declared that he died of AIDS, family and fans of Fela condemned him harshly for his openness. Many fans believed, without evidence, that security agents could have injected him with the HIV virus in many of his encounters with the state, most of which ended up with prison terms. [Source: Nigerian media, library materials, IPS bulletins] *Ayodele Lawal reports for the P.M. News in Lagos Nigeria, and Yinka Akinmoladun is a Program Officer at the Independent Journalism Center in Lagos, Nigeria.
|
|||||||||
|
|||||||||
|
|
|||||||||
