You have commented 339 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
Submit your comments on this article
International-UN-NGOs
UN calls for action to halt Aids
2005-06-03
Get the idea that Kofi is frantically trying to divert attention?
Aids is spreading faster than ever, outstripping efforts to contain it, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has said. "Last year saw more new infections and Aids-related deaths than ever before," Mr Annan told a conference in New York.

Only 12% of people with Aids in underdeveloped countries are getting anti-retroviral drugs, he added.

In 2001, the UN set a target date of 2015 to halt the spread of the disease but Mr Annan said better leadership and funding was needed to reach that goal. "The fight against Aids may be the great challenge of our age and our generation," Mr Annan told delegates. "Only if we meet this challenge can we succeed in our efforts to build a humane, healthy and equitable world.

"Instead of setting targets, this time leaders must decide how to achieve them."
Okay, listen to us Americans -- we have a plan. Oh. You don't like that one.
In a report published to coincide with the conference, Mr Annan warns that targets, such as cutting HIV infections in young people by 25% by 2005, will not be achieved. However, his report says funding for Aids work in developing countries has increased from $2bn in 2001 to about $8bn in 2005, although this still falls short of the resources the UN believes are needed to properly tackle the epidemic. It warns that, at the end of 2004, only 12% of the six million people who need HIV treatment worldwide had access to it and only one in five people across the world has access to prevention services.
Posted by:Steve White

#18  LH, you're describing the legacy of the afrikaners. The stats you omit include
-- ~50% unemployment
-- around one-third of South African women have been raped
-- Jo'burg is the most dangerous peacetime city on the planet

That's a pretty astonishing record of colossal failure across the board. SA today is a good example of the core African problem: brutal, kleptocratic, unbelievably incompetent regimes. Time for regime change, not debt forgiveness.
Posted by: thibaud (aka lex)   2005-06-03 13:16  

#17  Maybe if the UN peacekeepers would stop forcing themselves on all the underage girls, the infection rate might not be so bad.
Posted by: Mike   2005-06-03 11:07  

#16  CIA world factbook on SA economy:

"South Africa is a middle-income, emerging market with an abundant supply of natural resources; well-developed financial, legal, communications, energy, and transport sectors; a stock exchange that ranks among the 10 largest in the world; and a modern infrastructure supporting an efficient distribution of goods to major urban centers throughout the region. However, growth has not been strong enough to lower South Africa's high unemployment rate; and daunting economic problems remain from the apartheid era, especially poverty and lack of economic empowerment among the disadvantaged groups. South African economic policy is fiscally conservative, but pragmatic, focusing on targeting inflation and liberalizing trade as means to increase job growth and household income. "
Posted by: liberalhawk   2005-06-03 11:03  

#15  Yeah, S. Africa has some crazy dude in charge of their health system that preaches herbal remedies for aids and discourages people from using antiretroviral drugs. Probably because he stole all the money we sent them for the drugs and blew it on hookers and booze.
Posted by: bigjim-ky   2005-06-03 11:00  

#14  where are all the articles describing the "miserable failure" that is post-apartheid S Africa?

More like the miserable failure that is Mbeki, if you ask me. Under Mandela, despite his miserable foreign policy prediliction, SA was doing relatively well economically, and had made the change to majority rule surprisingly peacefully, despite a major crime problem. AFAIK the economic growth continues, as does the crime problem (if it hasnt actually intensified) Democracy still seems to be alive and well - but unfortunately thousands of South Africans will not be, cause of the AIDS policy. OTOH, South Africans have protested against the misguided AIDS policy, and theyre all still free - something you wouldnt find too many other places on the continent.

Mbekis incompetence on AIDS is more likely to take the ANC down than to take post Apartheid SA down, I think.
Posted by: liberalhawk   2005-06-03 10:54  

#13  Wow. Against AIDS. There's a bold stand.

Tell me, Mr. Kofi, what are your thoughts on ice cream?

LOL ... I also hear that he's anti-car-accident and pro-park! ;-D
Posted by: ExtremeModerate   2005-06-03 10:47  

#12  Wow. Against AIDS. There's a bold stand.

Tell me, Mr. Kofi, what are your thoughts on ice cream?
Posted by: eLarson   2005-06-03 09:25  

#11  Must be impacting their food-for-nookie program. Nonthing else can get Kofi's attention. Genocide, wholesale torture and murder doesn't so why should the welfare of millions of AIDS victims turn Kofi's head?

Look for a conference in S. Africa soon....
Posted by: CrazyFool   2005-06-03 08:49  

#10  UN calls for lots and lots and lots of money action to halt Aids
Posted by: tu3031   2005-06-03 08:25  

#9  Bravo, Mrs. D. Well said. It is sad that these entire communities may be doomed to be Darwin Award candidates.
Posted by: BA   2005-06-03 08:12  

#8  I see the opportunity for group as well as individual categories in the Darwin Awards. It is sad for the individuals involved, but reflects incredible stupidity. Portions of our gay community are equally obtuse.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis   2005-06-03 07:26  

#7  Not a concern in South Africa, where the gov't views Western anti-AIDs medications with the same horror as the Mullahs view the polio vaccine further north.
Posted by: trailing wife   2005-06-03 07:06  

#6  The reality is that AIDS is a lifestyle disease and any attempt to reduce transmission by antiviral drugs needs to take into account their effect on lifestyle as this article illustrates. In fact its worse because treatments that prolong life of infected persons means they have longer to infect others. The brutal reality is they condem millions more to HIV infection and AIDS. More treatment = faster spread.
Posted by: phil_b   2005-06-03 02:16  

#5  IINM South Africa's infection rate is now ~25% of the population. Given the MSM's obsession with reporting mistakes and failures in Iraq, where are all the articles describing the "miserable failure" that is post-apartheid S Africa?
Posted by: thibaud (aka lex)   2005-06-03 01:43  

#4  answer: yes - there will be massive depopulation of Africa, while the American president who's devotd the most actual resources and attention to the problem, Geo. W. Bush, will undoubtedly be the problem, not the solution. Welcome home, Alice
Posted by: Frank G   2005-06-03 00:27  

#3  I just read an article about Swaziland having 40% AIDS infection rate. Can a society survive a 40% rate of AIDS cases? Have Africans doomed themselves?
Posted by: bigjim-ky   2005-06-03 00:21  

#2  LOL

Thanks for the chuckle, muck...
Posted by: badanov   2005-06-03 00:15  

#1  ifn em un sayz stop. yalls beter stop!
Posted by: muck4doo   2005-06-03 00:07  

00:00