[African Aids Crisis] No Longer Out Of Sight Out Of Mind The African AIDS Crisis

From Relevant Magazine, written by Margaret Feinberg.

Recently, I was running some errands with a friend when she asked me about the assignments that I was working on. I mentioned that I working on an article on the AIDS crisis in Africa.

“I don’t know why we have to worry about a problem that’s overseas when we have so many problems of our own,” she said.

“Because it isn’t just men and women who have AIDS,” I explained. “It’s children. It’s babies. It’s kids who are orphans because both of their parents have died and they’re selling themselves on the street because they have nowhere else to go.”

My friend was quiet for a moment, then responded with a bit more tenderness in her voice, “Well, no one has ever explained it to me quite like that.”

For most Americans, myself included, it’s far too easy to dismiss the AIDS crisis in Africa as just another cause until we realize that the future of a continent is at stake. Already, life expectancy is falling in certain nations like Botswana. Schools are losing their teachers. Prisons don't have enough guards. Governments can't protect their peoplebecause their police and soldiers are dying. Churches are losing their members and some of their clergy.

Recah Theodosiou, a 27-year-old from South Africa, says, “I wish everyone realized that a person with AIDS in Africa is not as foreign to them as they think. Although Africa and America are very different places and far away from each other, Africans and Americans are all people with feelings, thoughts and emotions. I sometimes think that because Africa is far away and foreign, its crisis is not real to everyone and is easily forgotten. ‘Out of sight, out of mind’ as the saying goes.”

Theodosiou has seen the impact of AIDS in her home city of Port Elizabeth, which is located on the southeast coast of South Africa. She says there is only one haven offering free care for the estimated 100,000 impoverished people who are HIV-positive. This haven, the House of Resurrection, can only afford to care for about 12 children and eight adults at a time.

“Almost every patient at the haven has a horror story to tell of what their lives were like before they were fortunate enough to be able to receive care there,” Theodosiou says. “One of the boys, who is now 4 years old, was locked in a windowless back room of his house with no food when his family suspected he had AIDS after his parents died. Fortunately a neighbor alerted social services, which rescued him and brought him to the haven. He was severely malnourished and to this day has never said a word. He only motions ‘yes’ or ‘no’ with a shake or nod of his head.”

Another man at the haven, who is now 31 years old, was left in a cold hospital corridor to die because the hospital did not have the staff and resources to care for him, and a 7-year-old girl, whose mother died of AIDS and whose father wants nothing to do with her because she also has AIDS, is so depressed that the haven head, registered nurse Maggie Williams, says no antidepressant drugs seem to help her.

Today, Theodosiou lives in Nashville and works as a freelance journalist as well as a volunteer worker for the nonprofit organization DATA (Debt_AIDS_Trade_Africa). She says that it’s been challenging to raise awareness of the AIDS crisis. “I have noticed while living in America that because the country is so huge, most of the news coverage is concerned with America itself or where America is involved overseas, and there is far less coverage of international events,” she says.

“When the crisis was eventually brought to the attention of Americans and the American Church, I believe a general misunderstanding of AIDS in Africa prevented them from responding to it. I think people thought that because it is a sexually transmitted disease, the people who are infected brought it upon themselves, and many thought that it was spread predominantly by homosexual transmission, which it is not.”

“Perhaps the American Church was slow to respond specifically because the disease is sexually transmitted, and because responding to a disease on this scale was not part of its traditional missionary work of evangelism and caring for the general needs of the impoverished. I must say, though, that not only America but the whole world has been slow to respond to the crisis in Africa.”

HELPING HAND
So what can the average American do to help with the AIDS crisis?

The first is to give money, no matter how little, to a reputable on-the-ground project like the House of Resurrection haven. The only thing preventing this haven, and many other projects like it, from caring for more people is a lack of funding. You can help support a reputable nonprofit organization like DATA (www.data.org) or World Vision (www.worldvision.org). World Vision's Hope Initiative funds on-the-ground HIV/AIDS projects in Africa, and DATA lobbies first world governments to increase the amount of funding they use to help Africa with its AIDS crisis.

Second, you can encourage your senators and representatives to give more money to the global effort to help those with AIDS. This can be done simply by calling a toll-free number, which directs the caller to the relevant senator for the area where the call is made, and vocalizing support for America helping Africa with its AIDS crisis. This toll-free number is 1 877-HOPE-USA and is supported by DATA.

Third, you can help raise awareness of the issue. Read articles about the AIDS crisis and what the government is doing in response. Talk to friends about the issue, and help educate those who think that this is just another overseas problem.

[Margaret Feinberg is the author of Twentysomething: Thriving & Surviving in the Real World and God Whispers: Learning to Hear His Voice and Just Married: What Might Surprise You About the First Few Years (Harvest House Publishers). You can reach her at www.margaretfeinberg.com.]