Do high food prices have an effect on HIV?

    by Peace Nganwa

Recently, there has been a worldwide rise in food prices resulting from among others increasing oil prices; speculations on the financial markets; erratic weather patterns; subsidized production of biofuels; and population growth. The worst hit people are the poor-both rural and urban, who now have to spend a proportionately higher percentage of their meagre income on food <read more>

Focus on HIV/AIDS: livelihoods

Poverty and the Consumerist Culture; An analysis of HIV and AIDS infections among young women in Zimbabwe

    by Sandra Bhatasara

This is a commentary paper analyzing the dynamics of poverty and consumerism and HIV and AIDS infections among young women in Zimbabwe. The African continent is in a very precarious position economically and Zimbabwe is no exception among the countries that is in endemic poverty. There is no doubt that HIV and AIDS are thriving upon severe economic problems in Zimbabwe. In the Zimbabwean context, women have emerged as the poorest group as compared to their male counterparts. Scholars have come up with phrases such as ''poverty has a woman's face'' and ''the face of AIDS is an African woman'' to link issues of poverty, women and HIV and AIDS <read more>

Focus on HIV/AIDS: Treatment

Zimbabwe's Progress on ARV Rollout Programme for Children : Are We Moving Fast?

      by Hwara Stella

When HIV and AIDS was discovered in Zimbabwe, a high death rate including infant mortality was also observed. The number of women dying during child birth and after delivery was escalating. A similar pattern was also noted in the high percentage of infant mortality at birth and after birth as they fail to thrive. The health of the surviving mothers deteriorated fast making it an extra burden to care for the failure to thrive baby while at the same time concentrating on their ill-health. With the implementation of ARV Rollout Programmes in Zimbabwe, tremendous achievements are being observed. It is against this background that this paper seeks to comment on the progress made by Zimbabwe on ARV Rollout Programmes with special reference to children <read more>

Focus on HIV/AIDS: a typical workers
''It is the secretiveness of this virus that makes it the most deadly killer known to mankind''

News reports posit Africa's military on the meltdown due the scourge of HIV/AIDS. Unofficial estimates suggest that some militaries including the South African, Zimbabwean and Mozambican defense forces have a prevalence level of more than 50% that threatens to decimate the readiness and capability of Africa's armed forces to perform their duties. But is the situation as bad as it appears? Does HIV pose a tangible threat to peace and development on the African continent? And is the military taking HIV seriously enough?

Azad Essa speaks to Prof. Lindy Heinecken from the Dept of Sociology and Social Anthropology, Stellenbosch University on the extent of the threat <read more>

Focus on HIV/AIDS: prevention

Abstinence or safe sex: Still a debate?

     by Allan Moolman

The problem here is not that one or the other is a better approach. It is that we frame all of the discussion in the development sector as binary, either/or positions. This has led to a situation where  debate around the merits of each position take precedence over discussions about how to make prevention  strategies more workable and relevant to the communities they are targeted at <read more>

She smiled as she remembered the night it all began. He was so handsome and danced like there was no tomorrow. The music played softly in the background and the full moon cast a spell on the slow moving tightly embraced couple. That was truly a night designed especially for lovers, life, love and laughter, she thought <read more>