Posted on 01/08/2004 6:10:15 PM PST by blam
Aids in Africa 'overestimated'
By Adrian Blomfield in Nairobi
(Filed: 09/01/2004)
Millions of Africans believed to have HIV/Aids are free of the disease, according to research published yesterday.
The survey will dismay those who claim the West is ignoring a pandemic so acute it could wipe out the populations of entire African states.
Scientists said the new report would force a rethink in the way the United Nations measures Aids prevalence on the continent.
The preliminary report of the Kenya Demographic and Health Survey suggested that HIV has infected about one million adults in the country. Previous estimates put the number at up to three million.
Earlier surveys in Mali, Zambia and South Africa hinted that Aids might not be as widespread as believed, but scientists said the new data provided conclusive evidence. It will allow them to extrapolate the findings across the continent, which would reduce infection estimates by at least a quarter.
A leading western expert on Aids said: "We have the same thing coming from the south of Africa, from the west, from the centre and now from the east."
Based on samples from pregnant women and extrapolated across the population - a method critics say is flawed - UN and World Health Organisation estimates found 29.4 million Africans had the HIV virus.
Researchers from the Kenyan survey, funded and backed by Centres for Disease Control (CDC), a US government agency, tested 3,000 households, a far more representative sample.
Dr Kevin deCock, CDC's Kenya director, said that even if currently accepted figures have exceeded reality by a quarter, that would still leave 22 million infected by the virus.
Very dismaying indeed. Could we blame Milosevic for this genocide?
It runs along the lines of global warming, Europeans love clinton and other ways of using emotions instead of facts.
Nevertheless I wish more of Africa would use Uganda message of abstinence. A strength of a society is not determined by selfishness but self-control and selflessness.
Gee. Does this mean we get our $15-billion back?
America's Fifth Column ... watch PBS documentary JIHAD! In America
http://12thman.us/media/jihad.rm (Requires RealPlayer)
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