AIDS IN THE GLOBAL SOUTH
Panel Discussion Summary
by
Petra Ticha
On Monday, March 27, 2000, The
Center for the Global South hosted a panel discussion in the School of
International Service at the occasion of the AIDS Quilt visit to American
University. Participating in the panel were World AIDS Organization; Dr.
Paul Delay, Chief, HIV/AIDS Division, USAID; Dr. Charles Larson, Professor,
American University; and Dr. Fernando Zacharias, Director, Regional Office
for Americas, WHO.
Although each of the panelists'
presentations reflected the viewpoint and particular challenges of their
organizations, they all shared a common concern about the fact that HIV/AIDS
is no longer just a health issue, but, in a broader sense, also a development
problem. The proliferation of HIV/AIDS throughout the world has negative
impacts that hamper not only social, but also economic development, affecting
such areas as education, agriculture and private sector development. The
participating panelists agreed that the rapid growth of this modern epidemics
has proceeded markedly faster in developing countries of the South than
in the developed North. Most HIV/AIDS-infected people reside in Sub-Saharan
Africa and in Asia. The epidemics poses a major challenge especially in
these developing countries that lack sufficient financial resources to
combat the disease - either by providing treatment to the already infected
or by developing effective prevention strategies. According to these practitioners,
greater attention needs to be paid to the regions of Sub-Saharan Africa
and Asia where cost-effective prevention has a greater chance to be more
efficient than measures taken after the disease has fully matured. Close
cooperation between specialized agencies such as the Joint United Nations
Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) or the World Bank and individual national
governments remains essential for formulating successful strategies to
combat the disease.
The university setting
for this panel was particularly appropriate considering that according
to the World Bank statistics, the majority of newly infected people currently
fall into the category under 25 years of age. This event made a significant
contribution to increasing the awareness of the gravity of the HIV/AIDS
epidemics among students at American University.
