Drugs for AIDS should be received judiciously

Media coverage on AIDS is always disturbing, depressing and frightening. For South Africans afflicted by HIV there was some light at the end of the tunnel last week after their highest court ordered the government to stop blocking the universal provision of an anti-AIDS drug to prevent mother-to-child transmission of the disease.

The Constitutional Court’s decision removed the last obstacle put up by the government to the use of the drug Nevirapine that is said to cut mother-to-child transmission of HIV by up to half. Some government officials however argued that the drug could be more dangerous than the disease itself.

It was a victory for AIDS lobbyists and this is why supporters in the court cheered and applauded the ruling. Many activists with buttons or T-shirts proclaiming their HIV-positive status even danced outside the court.

One in nine South Africans is infected with the deadly HIV virus, and between 70,000 and 100,000 babies are born HIV-positive each year. AIDS activists say a universal roll-out of Nevirapine — said to cut mother-to-child transmission of the HIV virus by up to half — would save at least 30,000 babies from the disease. Analysts say up to 7 million South Africans could die of AIDS-related causes by 2010 if the government does not introduce more aggressive treatment and education programmes.

AIDS is increasingly becoming a liability to many countries while the number of afflicted grow. There are so many people, young and old on the brink of death many of who could have averted what afflicted them had they been less promiscuous or more alert about their partners. While there are a good number of those afflicted through no fault of theirs that category of sufferers are more of an exception than the norm.

In Tanzania we have equally alarming statistics for HIV and AIDS sufferers. Drugs such as Nevirapine can possibly help in alleviating the effects of the virus but it is still clear that there is nothing to cure the disease. Though sufferers in South Africa celebrated so much on the approval of usage of Nevirapine, one should remember that this drug does not cure the virus. Probably some or many of the sufferers may be harbouring pretentious thoughts that this drug will cure their ailment. Suffering people who see no end to their miseries often convert half-truths to truths, which is natural and helpful because positive thinking is healthy for anybody.

The danger in this scenario is that those unaffected by the virus may interpret the effectiveness of this new drug as a cure to the virus. This would allow them to continue with their illicit sexual and other bad habits without realising that their short-term pleasures could lead to a lifetime of misery. Drugs for AIDS may be helpful but they should always be received judiciously rather than being considered as miracle cure-alls that they are not.