Uganda has made tremendous strides in containing the AIDS
pandemic.
For some of us who were around in the 1980s and saw the
worst effects of the AIDS pandemic, the way the country has contained the
disease is not what we had envisaged back then.
Ignorance, stigma and lack of drugs surrounding the disease
saw thousands die horrible deaths – wasting away, tortured by opportunistic
diseases and being shirked by family and a society out fear.
The doomsayers
were projecting a major fall in our population, a collapse of the economy and a
total breakdown of social cohesion.
That the country is still around and fighting back the
disease successfully, could not have been envisaged in those scary days of the
1980s when the disease came into the public conscious.
Thankfully rather than sweep the problem under the carpet
like many of the neighbouring countries, President Yoweri Museveni led a fight
back against AIDS that had at its core widespread dissemination of information
about the disease, availability of life-saving drugs and increased research
into the disease within our means.
That is to understate the tremendous work that was done to
reduce prevalence rates from as high as 30 percent in the 1980s to six percent
in 2016.
Unfortunately it is not time to rest on our laurels.
According to the UNAIDS in 2017 there were 21,000 new HIV
infections among Ugandans 19 – 29. While this has come down from 25,000 in 2015
clearly these are 21,000 people too many.
While it is true that advances in medicine and treatment has
seen people infected with HIV leave much longer lives than below their
capacities are still diminished. We should be uncompromising in seeking to
obliterate the disease altogether.
According to the same study projecting into the future we
can prevent 260,000 new infections between now and 2050 if we further scale up
current prevention tools, but if we scale up current initiatives and add new
prevention tools we could spare 364,000
youth contracting the virus that cause AIDS.
Government has announced a new initiative the 90:90:90
strategy -- diagnose 90 percent of people living with HIV, provide
Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART) to 90 percent of those diagnosed with HIV and
achieve 90 percent viral suppression of those treated by 2020.
Understandably the business community is concerned with the
fight against HIV/AIDS as it affects the productivity of our workers, increases
medical costs and is generally not good for business.
The business community has always been concerned that HIV/AIDS
attacks the most productive segment of our population which is not good for the
general economy.
The roll back of the
pandemic has been largely aided by foreign money, which while we will forever
be grateful for that it is incumbent upon us as a nation to find our own
resources to supplement these generous offerings or surpass them altogether.
After all it is we who are in need and what better to show that charity begins
at home than to pull up our socks and carry our own weight.
In 2016 the One Dollar a Day Initiative was launched which
aimed at mobilise resources domestically to assist in the battle against
HIV/AIDS. The idea is for all of us to contribute one dollar, about sh4000 per
month ideally or one dollar per annum for the rural farmers as a moral
commitment. Of course multiple contributions in the year are more than welcome.
The resources thus mobilised will go towards HIV prevention
measures among vulnerable groups, increase health service coverage and support
private sector interventions targeted at HIV/AIDS.
As part of this initiative I invite all Ugandans who want to
help in the struggle to a walk-run this Sunday, 9th December from
the constitutional square to Uganda Manufacturers’ Association (UMA) show
ground at Lugogo.
As a country we have come back from the brink of disaster,
but there is still some way to go and we daren’t let down our guard now.
So come with friends and family to support this worthy
cause.
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