VoyForums
[ Show ]
Support VoyForums
[ Shrink ]
VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, [3], 4 ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: 19:47:17 07/24/02 Wed
Author: moonotter
Subject: AIDS Abolishes Life-Expectancy Gains Achieved in Africa Over Past Century

AIDS Abolishes Life-Expectancy Gains Achieved in Africa Over Past Century


Reuters Health Information 2002. © 2002 Reuters Ltd.
Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters shall not be liable for any errors or delays in the content, or for any actions taken in reliance thereon. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.


BARCELONA, Spain (Reuters Health) Jul 08 - The average life expectancy of people in eleven African countries will drop below 40 by 2010 as HIV continues to shorten the lives of millions, US government researchers said on Sunday.
"By 2010, we project that life expectancies in these countries will be back to levels that have not been seen since the nineteenth century," US Census Bureau's Karen Stanecki told reporters at the International AIDS Conference. "Unfortunately, many African countries are only beginning to see the impact of high levels of HIV prevalence."

Her "middle-case scenario" report, which assumes that the epidemic will begin to level off in Africa over the next 8 years, predicts that the average life expectancy in Botswana and Mozambique will drop to 27 years. Swaziland will see an average of 33 years and Zimbabwe, Zambia and Namibia 34 years. Angola, Lesotho, Malawi and Rwanda and Mali will see life expectancy drop to the mid to late 30s.

The figures, prepared on behalf of the US Agency for International Development, are just the latest in a series that show Africa buckling under the growing AIDS pandemic. Sub-Saharan Africa has some 28 million of the world's 40 million infected people, with infection rates rising over 30% in some countries.

Without AIDS, average life in southern African countries such as Botswana, Namibia and Swaziland would have been around 70 years by 2010, the report shows.

Instead, deaths will outstrip births in five countries by 2010, meaning negative population growth. Without AIDS, Botswana, Mozambique, Lesotho, Swaziland and South Africa would have expected a population growth rate of at least 2%, Stanecki said.

The Census Bureau report confirms that the epidemic will continue to undermine the economic stability of Africa, with the biggest increases in early deaths coming among people in their 30s, 40s and 50s, when they would be at their most productive.

It also shows that the millions of AIDS orphans currently overwhelming many countries will be a growing problem.

"You have a lot of adults missing, and then you have a lot of children who don't have adult supervision or don't have adult leadership. That means increases in orphans, increases in street children," Stanecki said.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

[ Contact Forum Admin ]

Forum timezone: GMT-6
VF Version: 3.00b, ConfDB:
Before posting please read our privacy policy.
VoyForums(tm) is a Free Service from Voyager Info-Systems.
Copyright © 1998-2019 Voyager Info-Systems. All Rights Reserved.