First republican President Kenneth Kaunda says the Kenneth Kaunda Children of Africa Foundation, KKCAF, has helped scale down the HIV and AIDS prevalence from 19 per cent to about 16 per cent in the country.
Speaking when he paid a courtesy call on Chipata District Commissioner, John Soko,
today Dr Kaunda said although the HIV and AIDS prevalence has declined, more effort
is needed to fight the pandemic.
He said there is need to sensitize people on the dangers of HIV and AIDSÂ through
the promotion of behaviour change as a measure of addressingssen the further spread
of the disease.
He also called for conserted efforts in the fight against stigma so that infected people should not feel isolated but encouraged to lead normal lives in order for them to effectively contribute to national development.
And Eastern province Minister, Lameck Mangani, said government appreciated the
efforts of the KKCAF in the fight against HIV and AIDS especially that it devastated
the youth.
And Mr. Soko commended the foundation for involving the district in its programmes.
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This is one very poor piece of journalistic work. I fully agree KK is doing great to bring down the incidence of HIV and to promote access to treatment. but there are yet no figures to back this claim up with. 16% is a figure quoted from Demographic Health Survey, 2001. 19% was a cooked up figure (i.e. statistical model based) by the UN. So we dont know anything about trends until we see the new DHS results in a year or so. Anedotal data suggests a decline though.