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Email this citationCIAO DATE: 08/04
HIV/AIDS as a Security Issue in Africa: Lessons from Uganda
April 16, 2004
Abstract
HIV/AIDS prevention and conflict prevention should go hand in hand. They are the two blades of the scissors required to cut the strangler's cord choking Africa. Some 2.5 million Africans will die of AIDS in 2004. One in four African countries presently suffers from the effects of armed conflict.
The correlation of HIV/AIDS and war is difficult to calculate with precision because the data are less than complete, and numerous interacting factors are at play. Nevertheless, the evidence available demonstrates that war can lead to increased risks of HIV/AIDS and suggests that HIV/AIDS can make conflicts worse. While the relationship between these two scourges is too complex to be expressed in simple cause-andeffect terms, it is important to consider how the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Africa contributes to further instability and conflict on the continent and how violent conflict in turn creates conditions favourable to the spread of the virus.
