PWRDF rep says HIV/AIDS in Africa serious, but not without hope

The continent of Africa continues to be the area most seriously affected by HIV/AIDS, a representative of the Primate's World Relief and Development Fund reported, but the struggle against the disease is not without hope.

Zaida Bastos, Africa program coordinator for PWRDF, at a meeting at Christ Church Cathedral last month said that the death toll from AIDS in Africa continues at the rate of over 1.5 million people and 25 million are infected each year.

Some villages which set aside cemeteries they hoped would serve for at least a decade have found them filling up within two or three years.

PWRDF is active in several countries funding locally initiated programs of HIV/AIDS education and care giving, Bastos said. She said the selfless efforts of many African women caregivers, now being joined by some men, are comforting the dying and, in some cases prolonging lives.

Increased availability of three types of first generation antiretroviral drugs has meant that being diagnosed with HIV is not an immediate death threat. The drugs in many cases can keep people alive for five or more years.

She urged Anglicans to continue to urge the Canadian government to live up to its commitment to increase assistance to African countries, and to lobby governments and pharmaceutial companies to make the needed drugs available.