Aid awareness in Sub Saharan Africa
By Hussein Farah
Surprising facts
- Sub-Saharan Africa is more heavily affected by HIV and AIDS than any other region of the world.
- A number of African countries have conducted large-scale HIV prevention initiatives in an effort to reduce the scale of their epidemics.
- The long-term impact on African societies of some 11 million AIDS orphans in sub-Saharan Africa has been featured less often.
- In all heavily affected countries the HIV and AIDS epidemic is adding additional pressure on the health sector.
What happens to the children
- The epidemic not only causes children to lose their parents or guardians, but sometimes their childhood as well.
- Because AIDS claims the lives of people at an age when most already have young children, more children have been orphaned by AIDS in Africa than anywhere else.
- As projections of the number of AIDS orphans rise, some have called for an increase in institutional care for children.
Getting better
- Africa's overall HIV prevalence appears to have declined slightly since 2000.
- However, because of general population growth and increased access to treatment the number of people living with HIV continues to rise.
- The number of AIDS-related deaths in Sub-Saharan Africa in 2011 was 33 percent less than the number in 2005.