University of Zambia Medical Library
HIV/AIDS in Zambia: January - February 1999
- "Discrimination Against HIV Positive Employees Fought." By Priscilla Chela"
Times of Zambia, February 13, 1999
AIDS, now, is the most commonly mentioned pandemic. That's because it's taking away the lives of just about all the people known to all. The young and old, the employed and the unemployed alike. It is a pestilence which has left cemeteries full. The reality of it is shocking to so many people.
Amazingly, a lot of workers who have tested HIV positive are reportedly discriminated against and many perceive this as a very unfair treatment on the part of employers.
Network of Zambia for People Living With HIV/AIDS spokesman, Mr David Chipanta said a lot of HIV positive employees have had their services terminated all because they had tested HIV positive. He said a lot of these people have not been allowed to pursue their careers because of this deadly disease.
Says Chipanta: "Discrimination against HIV positive people in work places is there but very subtle. Many employers dismiss their HIV positive employees out of minor excuses.
"A mistake by an HIV positive employee like coming late for work and maybe indiscipline could be a source for the dismissal of such an employee.
"The actual reality is that these employers look for an excuse to dismiss such employees so that it may look as if they did not dismiss them by virtue of them being HIV positive."
He, however, said an HIV positive employee can be relieved from his services on medical grounds, that is, when he proves he can't cope with work because of deteriorating health. He added: "It is unfair for any employer to dismiss anyone who is HIV positive if he is capable and able to perform his duties according to the required standards.
"I have been living as an HIV positive person since 1991 and I'm healthy and very productive. All I'm trying to say is that HIV on its own does not remove my capacity to contribute towards the development of society.
According to a report on the Private Sector AIDS policy (PSAP), Business Managing HIV/AIDS, the response of the business sector to HIV/AIDS prevention has been mixed.
Some companies responded early and aggressively to provide information to employees and to shape policies to guide the corporate system. Other companies deny, after a decade or more of the epidemic, that HIV/AIDS is a problem for their business operations.
"Business people are interested in profits and a work force that will assure the steady generation of profits. They may be moved, in part, by appeals to ethics, national interest, and compassion. But they will not be moved if the appeals do not offer the probability of improved profits, the report said. Medical staff and personnel managers often admit readily that HIV exists within the workplace. In financial terms, HIV/AIDS will have a substantial impact by both reducing business revenues and increasing business expenditures.
What will HIV/AIDS cost a business over the next 5-10 years?
The answer is unique to each business and, in part, dependent on HIV/AIDS prevention activities within the country. However, businesses are likely to experience lost revenues and increased expenditures because of:
- Absenteeism of employees due to HIV and AIDS-related illness and time off for employees attending funerals of colleagues who died of AIDS
- Absenteeism especially if it is sporadic and difficult to predict, reduces overall productivity and threatens timely delivery of orders.
- Labour turnover and productivity losses associated with the loss of skilled and experienced staff as well as the fact that new employees are unlikely to be as productive as the people they replace in the first months on the job.
The (PSAP) states that it may be effective for managers to have a responsibility to protect the interests and assets of their corporations. A healthy and productive work force -one of the key assets of any firm- is at stake with AIDS, and hence the productivity of the organisation. Thus, while AIDS is ultimately a human concern and crisis, it's also a corporate one. Helping workers to prevent HIV/AIDS is helping the company protect its business and assets.
PSAP says transmission of HIV poses little risk in most work settings, but it is important to be aware of what the risks are and how they can be reduced.
Employees who are living with HIV infection are likely to be productive workers for years to come. Many companies have established a formal policy of "reasonable accommodation"
This means that the company makes changes in the work environment or the way things are normally done to enable otherwise qualified employees to conduct their jobs.
Employees are aware of the way they and others are treated. Personal experiences will be powerful examples that will either bolster or hurt the organisation's external image and workers' commitment to their jobs.
Without adequate information and training, co-workers may be afraid to work with others who they know or believe are infected with HIV.
This can result in major disruptions in the workplace, even though the infected employee poses no risk. PSAP has recommended the following as workplace HIV/AIDS Policies:
- Compulsory pre-employment or employee HIV/AIDS screening is not practiced
- All medical records are to be kept confidential
- Persons with HIV infection have the same rights and benefits as others with serious illnesses or disabilities
- Stigmatization and discrimination will not be tolerated
HIV/AIDS is not a cause for termination of employment. The World Health Organisation/International Labour Office's survey on the workplace responses to AIDS stated the following as the benefits of appropriate HIV/AIDS policies:
- Sets foundation for a HIV/AIDS prevention program
- Provides framework for consistency of practice within business
- Expresses standards of behaviour expected of employees
- Lets employees know where to get assistance and what assistance is available
- Instructs supervisors on how to manage employees with HIV/AIDS
- Assures consistency with relevant government statutes.
However deadly AIDS is, it should not be the sole factor for an employer to terminate the services of his employee. If the employee despite being HIV positive, is capable enough to perform his duties and can comply to the required standards of company performance, then he should be given a chance to work. -
- "Orphans Worry Mayor."
Times of Zambia, February 1, 1999
Ndola mayor Stanslaus Kazembe has bemoaned the rise in the number of
orphans who often end up on the streets. He said yesterday that the number of commercial sex workers and HIV/AIDS cases were on the increase and thanked Savoir Faire, a non governmental organisation, for trying to reduce the spread of HIV/AIDS through awareness
campaigns. Mr Kazembe cited poverty and illiteracy as some of the root causes of social vices. He was opening a guardian-parent orphan awareness seminar at George township outside Ndola.
Project executive director Philimon Phiri said both Ndola urban and Ndola Rural had over 300 orphans most of whom were not going to school for lack of money. He said his organisation had managed to assist 87 youths to go to school. -
- "US Officials Here to Assess AIDS Impact."
Times of Zambia, January 29, 1999
US President Bill Clinton has sent an official to assess the impact
of AIDS on children in Zambia, a statement from the US embassy released in
Lusaka yesterday said. Directors of the office of national AIDS policy at the White House, Sandra Thurman arrived in Zambia on Wednesday and is expected to return home
today.
During her visit, Ms Thurman met Zambian Government officials and visited
communities and institutions in Lusaka and the Copperbelt. "She is here at President Clinton's request to see first-hand how the AIDS epidemic is affecting the children of Zambia," she said. Ms Thurman was appointed to her White House position in April 1997 after more than a decade of service as a leader and advocate of people with AIDS
at the local, state and federal levels. -
- "Gonorrhoea/Syphilis." By Dr Agzamov
The Post, January 15, 1999
Gonorrhea is a common sexually transmitted disease (STD) which, if not
treated early can cause serious problems, especially for women.
It is possible to have gonorrhea without any symptoms. If symptoms do
appear, they may include discharge from the penis or vagina, the need to
urinate often, burning sensation or pain when urinating, and in women,
bleeding between monthly periods. About half of the women with gonorrhea
have no symptoms.
The only way to find out whether or not you have gonorrhea is to get
tested. The test is simple: the doctor takes a sample of fluid from the
penis or vagina and sends it to a lab. Gonorrhea is treated with antibiotics. Common treatments use drugs such as ciprofloxacinofloxacin, cefixime, ceftriaxone, and most recently, azithromycin. Azithrymcyin is a single dose oral medication. The most
common side effects with 2-gram azithromycin include nausea, diarrhoea/loose stools, vomiting, abdominal pain, vaginitis, dyspepsia and dizziness.
Ineffective or incomplete treatment can result in serious problems later,
such as chronic lower abdominal pain, sterility, tubal pregnancy and
painful joints. In order to avoid reinfection and potential transmission of
infection to others, you should stop having sex until both you and your
partner are cured. You can get and spread gonorrhea through oral, anal and vaginal sex.
Preventing gonorrhea means approaching sexual relationships responsibly:
limit the number of your sex partners, use con-doms, and if you think you
are infected, avoid any sexual contact and visit a local STD clinic,
hospital or your doctor. Make sure both partners are treated.
Syphilis is a serious disease that can be debilitating and even result in
death if left untreated. You can have syphilis without knowing it and pass
it on to others. Syphilis has three stages. During the first stage, painless sore may appear at the spot where the bacteria first entered the body (usually from 10 to
90 days after sexual contact with an infected person). This sore may appear
around or in the vagina, on the penis, or inside the mouth or anus.
Sores inside the vagina or anus are often unnoticed and may disappear on
their own if not treated, but the bacterial infection remains.
The second stage occurs from three weeks to three months after the primary
stage and includes flue-like symptoms and possible hair loss. Some people
experience a rash on the palms and soles as well as over the entire body.
Althought extremely rare, tertiary syphillis can appear three to ten years
or more after the first and second stages. Symptoms of this stage may
include skin lesions, mental deterioration, loss of balance and vision,
loss of sensation, shooting pains in the legs, and heart disease.
See a doctor immediately if there is a chance that you have been exposed to
syphillis.
A simple blood test can usually determine whether or not you
have the disease. However, if you become infected two to three weeks prior
to testing, the blood test might not be sensitive enough to pick it up.
Fortunately, syphilis can be treated with proper antibiotics. The most
common treatment are penicillin injections.
You can get and spread syphilis through oral, anal and vaginal sex.
Preventing syphilis means approaching sexual relationships responsibly:
limit the number of your sexual partners, use condoms and if you think you
are infected, avoid any sexual contact and visit a local STD clinic,
hospital, or you doctor immediately. Your partner must be tested as well. -
- "HIV/AIDS Cases Under Reported in Zambia." By Reuben Phiri
The Post, January 11, 1999
There has been under-reporting of the statistics of the HIV/AIDS pandemic
for various reasons like researchers not reaching certain areas, programmes
officer at Family Health Trust Prisca Chintomfwa disclosed.
Chintomfwa, speaking at a stakeholders meeting at Pamodzi Hotel last
Friday, also disclosed that Zambia had joined a multi-national campaign to
promote responsible sexual behaviour and self-empowerment among African
youths.
The initiative dubbed Africa Alive according to the organisers of the
meeting was meant to sensitise the youths on the HIV/AIDS pandemic.
The campaign will culminate into a 12-hour concert which will take place
about the same time of the International AIDS conference in Durban, South
Africa in the year 2000.
During an overview presentation, Chintomfwa further disclosed that there
was an estimated number of more than one million Zambians infected with
HIV/AIDS. "The figure could be more but there has been under reporting for various
reasons," she said. "Poverty and relatively low health status and certain traditional practices like dry sex are also some of the causes of the spread of AIDS," she said.
-
- "Board Warns Over AIDS Cure Claims." By Sheikh Chifuwe
Times of Zambia, January 9, 1999
Central Board of Health (CBOH) public health and clinical systems manager
Dr Moses Sichone has warned members of the public to be cautious with
people claiming to have a cure for the deadly AIDS virus saying there was
still no scientific evidence that HIV/AIDS is curable. Reacting to claims by a Lusaka healer that he was able to cure Aids, Dr Sichone said whatever the man was claiming was not true. "Whatever this man is saying, is not true. He is just making statements to the media. No one in the world has found the cure," Dr Sichone said.
Roadside Clinic International proprietor "Dr" Arthur Makunga Siwelwa claimed on Wednesday that he had a cure for Aids/HIV using prayers andherbs. "Dr" Siwelwa said confirmed cases from the University Teaching Hospital (UTH) had been cured when they visited his clinic. Quoting some Bible verses, "Dr" Siwelwa said he used herbs as shown to him in visions after prayers and most Aids/HIV patients who had used such
medicines had been cured.
He explained that he started administering his medicine in 1991 and nobody
had complained to him about his medicines. "The so called Aids in God's understanding is curable. Many people think that no one can cure Aids/HIV but here I am," he said.
One of the medicines that "Dr" Siwelwa uses is known as Zamblina Cell Activator.
He said people who have visited him for treatment had tested HIV negative
even when they had earlier tested positive.
"Dr" Siwelwa said he is a member of the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Lusaka.
He said he was not a traditional healer nor a witchdoctor and his doctorate
was based on the Bible in the book of Jeremiah 8: 21-22. "The Lord wants to put things in us and all he wants us to do is to come back to him and we are going to receive treatment. The Bible says give doctors the honour they deserve, for the Lord gives them the work to do," he said. -
- "Is K-Punch a Cure for AIDS?." By Mike Moono
Times of Zambia, January 7, 1999
Note from moderator: This article basically is an advertisement. It is included since it is representative of some of the AIDS discussion in the Zambian print media.
Towards the end of the fifteenth century, a pandemic of venereal syphilis
swept through Europe with a high death rate. Since syphilis, unlike plague, was sexually transmitted there was panic and chaos during the syphilis pandemic.
There was a claim that syphilis was brought back from the Americas, by
Columbus and his sailors. Others claimed it was a curse from God or the
work of witchcraft or probably created by doctors.
A more plausible claim was that, syphilis may have occurred as result of
change in host-bacteria a relation of an already existing syphilis
bacteria. Of course, nobody could pinpoint exactly where syphilis had come from. But
syphilis has a family, the treponema, i.e. turning thread. Many bacteria
belonging to this family look alike and they existed before syphilis.
There was indeed panic. Politicians and the ordinary people declared
mankind will be wiped out and that nobody will be left on earth.
Syphilis broke social barriers. All types of people were infected,
including kings and queens, emperors and empresses, princes and princesses,
master and the servant, clergy and the laity, husband and wife.
It did not spare the, manager and the secretary, villagers and the town
people, the married and the single, doctors nurses and the patient, the
rich and the poor, the adulterer and the adulteress too were not left out,
the good and the bad, the beautiful and the ugly. Many people were infected except the very old who were not sexually active. Many children were left as orphans, and many citizens died. The rich died leaving their riches. The poor died in dire poverty. Others
died lonely and miserably. The living feared the dead lest they contracted
the disease. Wives deserted husbands or vice versa, brother deserted
brother or sister. Relatives were deserting one another. Others tried to
run to other parts of the world of the time but they had already contracted
the disease and in the process spread it.
Since syphilis was and is sexually transmitted nobody wanted to admit that
they had the disease. Families broke up. Divorce rates shot up. There were accusation and counter-accusation between wife and husband, among families, boyfriend and
girlfriend, adulterer and adulteress and fornicators. Suffering from
syphilis was a terrible stigma. People were frightened to reveal the illness lest they became outcast. But no one could tell who had the disease except the patient himself.
The press of the time put the last nail into the coffin. "There is no-cure
for syphilis and mankind will be wiped out," ran the headlines. It was a miserable time for the patients. Some committed suicide. Some crazy people used syphilis as a weapon of revenge. They deliberately infected others.
Even though there was no cure for syphilis, there were various means of
treatment. Claims and counter-claims were made on the cure the disease.
Patients were bled white in order to remove the germ from the body. For the
same reason, they were purged to the bone. Others were given medicine to
sweat or salivate the germ out. Various concoctions were used but to no avail. Heat treatment was used in order to kill the germ in the body.
Of course there were tattoos too and men of God who promised miraculous
cure. However, even those who claimed to have the cure died of the same
disease!
Rich people were discouraged from seeking treatment and cheated by
relatives or friends in the hope that they would inherit the wealth.
But even the very same relatives eventually died of syphilis. Nobody was
willing to pay for the treatment of the others. Preventive measures were put in place. Crude condoms were used by those who could afford them. People were advised to avoid sex or stick to one partner. But could they stick to one partner when they were sexually active? The pandemic continued to spread. It was claiming the cream of the society who could not be replaced. Mercury, Bismuth, Iodide, Arsphenamine and eventually Penicillin. At first few people could afford the treatment as the medicines were very expensive.
Even then, where new drugs of hope were introduced people were sceptical.
After all syphilis was a curse from God and there was no cure.
The new drugs would only suppress the symptoms but not cure the disease.
If they recovered as a result of the treatment, they claimed they had not
been suffering from the disease, after all, there was no cure for syphilis.
What happened to this pandemic? Syphilis, a tourist who had come to visit
Europe but decided to stay, is no longer a killer disease. But it is still
with us! Now even the untreated syphilis has a low death rate, an example of the way
in which 'new' infections gradually lose their severity over time as the
body adapts and builds up resistance. People had gone back to their normal social life and it was no longer a cause of panic and mankind had not been wiped out.
Syphilis is caused by a spiral bacteria, Treponema Pillidum, which looks
like other members of this group, the treponema, such as treponema pertunue, treponema pallidum. Monkeys and rabbits can be infected with treponema pallidum.
Does the story on syphilis remind you of something? History has a knack of
repeating itself and we don't seem to learn from history. History has repeated itself in HIV/AIDS infection. Don't despair, HIV infection can be cured.
A formula developed by Ndola doctor Francis Khama, exists and is available
for sale to a buyer. The medicine, dubbed the K-punch, cures HIV/AIDS by
repressing the HIV genes so that they don't replicate.
With repressed HIV genes no new viruses are formed. The human Immune
deficiency virus in the blood is destroyed by the body's defence systems
which the K-Punch restores.
Because of repression of HIV genes and destruction of the HIV by the body
defence systems transmission of the HIV to partners or the baby in pregnant
women is minimised. Why do we say the K-Punch is a cure for HIV/AIDS?
Some 70-80% of adults have herpes simplex virus or TB bacteria in the body.
But these microbes are made dormant by the body defence system and don't
cause any illness in the people carrying them. The people carrying these
dormant microbes are healthy and are cured of these diseases. Further more, six to 70% of adults carry the parasite that causes malaria without any ill effect. A blood slide for malaria parasite will be positive in these people. These people have been cured of malaria after taking drugs.
The K-Punch cures HIV/AIDS by repressing the HIV, making it dormant and you
lead a normal healthy life with HIV in your body. Just like herpes simplex,
TB or malaria. For details on K-Punch contact:
Mike Moono, Golden Media Agency
P.O.Box 240548, Telefax 612476, NDOLA -
- "18 M Condoms Used in 1997." By Kelvin Shimo
The Post, January 8, 1999
Eighteen million condoms were used in the country in 1997 while statistics
for 1998 are still being compiled. Central Board of Health (CBOH) public health and clinical systems manager Dr. Moses Sichone said condoms' use in Zambia has increased with statistics showing that in 1990,-a million were consumed, 1992 -2.5 million, 1994
-five million and 1997 -18 million.
He yesterday said stringent quality control measures to make sure no
defective condoms enter Zambia have been put in place. Dr. Sichone said the procurement of condoms by private individuals posed a serious risk to the nation as control measures may not be adhered to strictly.
"We have not had any report of defective condoms so far though that can
happen depending on the way condoms are handled," he said. He said storage rules, expiry date and insertion should be observed to avoid failure. He noted that condoms' use alone will not reduce AIDS in Zambia. "We need a multi approach to arrest the spread of HIV/AIDS," said Dr.Sichone.
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