Mr Benji,
Well observed. This is not to rule out the effect of the legit issues you've raised -- the whole scourge is complex! But, to me, the main problem with this menace (in our country and in many parts of the world) is the difficulty in the management of behavior change -- this is the hardest part, I think! People preach one thing and they do exactly the contrary! As we know, research studies have cogently shown that HIV/AIDS (plus its opportunistic infections) is significantly associated with poverty, literacy, and many other socio-ecominc factors -- which hit, badly, the least developed countries (LDCs), more than the West. This said, the effective use of protective "gadgets" (re condoms etc) also varies significantly across the globe and the LDCs, I believe, play very poorly on the majority of these areas and thus, the escalating prevalent rates.
For example, look how well Uganda did in the early 80s in the fight against HIV/AIDS re advocating awareness ...they obtained nearly 99% rate (as a role model) -- the HIV/AIDS prevalent rates drop tremendously. People used to wear tags with a "I'm HIV Positive" label -- that scared people to their spines -- behavior improved (those days). But what do we see in the same country now? The numbers are astonishingly skyrocketing! The same is happening all over the world, especially in the LDCs. I was surprised one day as we did HIV/AIDS sentinel surveillance, surveying some commercial sex workers-CSWs (aka prostitutes) in their hideouts (brothels) around Kenya in the mid 90s. Majority of them (whose clients were mainly track-drivers) said they would rather get HIV/AIDS than get Malaria! Reason was that former gives a window of time for you to enjoy life while the former kills you in hrs...what a response! This is the time when some strategies were laid out by groups (in the fight against HIV/AIDS) in the country devised a strategy to put some of the CSWs into small income generating projects and monitored them -- a lot did very well and stopped the CSW business. So, to me, if a method can be found to help foster behavior change, that would have a positive impact in mitigating HIV/AIDS.
Chris
From: Mr BENJI <me_benji@yahoo.com>
To: mlalahoi@googlegroups.com
Sent: Thu, July 15, 2010 5:02:59 AM
Subject: Re: HIV VACCINE
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Well observed. This is not to rule out the effect of the legit issues you've raised -- the whole scourge is complex! But, to me, the main problem with this menace (in our country and in many parts of the world) is the difficulty in the management of behavior change -- this is the hardest part, I think! People preach one thing and they do exactly the contrary! As we know, research studies have cogently shown that HIV/AIDS (plus its opportunistic infections) is significantly associated with poverty, literacy, and many other socio-ecominc factors -- which hit, badly, the least developed countries (LDCs), more than the West. This said, the effective use of protective "gadgets" (re condoms etc) also varies significantly across the globe and the LDCs, I believe, play very poorly on the majority of these areas and thus, the escalating prevalent rates.
For example, look how well Uganda did in the early 80s in the fight against HIV/AIDS re advocating awareness ...they obtained nearly 99% rate (as a role model) -- the HIV/AIDS prevalent rates drop tremendously. People used to wear tags with a "I'm HIV Positive" label -- that scared people to their spines -- behavior improved (those days). But what do we see in the same country now? The numbers are astonishingly skyrocketing! The same is happening all over the world, especially in the LDCs. I was surprised one day as we did HIV/AIDS sentinel surveillance, surveying some commercial sex workers-CSWs (aka prostitutes) in their hideouts (brothels) around Kenya in the mid 90s. Majority of them (whose clients were mainly track-drivers) said they would rather get HIV/AIDS than get Malaria! Reason was that former gives a window of time for you to enjoy life while the former kills you in hrs...what a response! This is the time when some strategies were laid out by groups (in the fight against HIV/AIDS) in the country devised a strategy to put some of the CSWs into small income generating projects and monitored them -- a lot did very well and stopped the CSW business. So, to me, if a method can be found to help foster behavior change, that would have a positive impact in mitigating HIV/AIDS.
Chris
From: Mr BENJI <me_benji@yahoo.com>
To: mlalahoi@googlegroups.com
Sent: Thu, July 15, 2010 5:02:59 AM
Subject: Re: HIV VACCINE
| I must say that as a young person who lived in Kenya my first 20 years, then in the States over 10 years I was always astounded by the fact that in the West people can be very promiscious and I even remember seeing so many 14 year olds in Chicago pushing trolleys with children. Basically children raising children. But with the great lifestyles, fast life, big money and creature comforts I must say AIDs was but a rumour. Statistics might show an infected rate of 8% but still this the USA is a country of over 300 million most dating widely, high divorce rates, high child birth etc. Meanwhile in Africa, where values and religion are embraced and people will not even hold hands on the street guess what AIDS is the main topic, front and centre wreaking havoc. There must be some sort of conspiracy and the whole thing about vaccines and how the medical devolpment in Kenya was quicklt shrouded in secrecy is absurd. Even with education on prophylactics and condom distribution AIDs has still managed to wipe out entire villages in Africa. The West cannot be trusted. --- On Wed, 7/14/10, JOSEPH NYONGESA <josefnyongesa@gmail.com> wrote:
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