󰕄 󰌻 󰗃 󰏲 Call Us: +256 (0)414 337 000 󰍎 Plot 19/21 First Street, Industrial Area,

HOME NEWS MEDIA SUPPLEMENTS TENDERS NOTICES PODCASTS E-PAPER JOBS VISION

September 11, 2023 01:27:13

VISION TVS & RADIO BUKEDDE AMAWULIRE KAMPALA SUN
pm

HIV/AIDS, the new war in northern

Uganda
󱑓 May 17, 2009

RECENTLY, World Vision International, a local charity helping persons affected by

HIV/AIDS, released a report with worrying statistics about northern Uganda.
According to the findings, HIV infection rate across the northern districts now stands
at 11.9% h
RECENTLY, World Vision International, a local charity helping persons affected by HIV/AIDS, released a
report with worrying statistics about northern Uganda. According to the findings, HIV infection rate
across the northern districts now stands at 11.9% higher than the national rate of 6.4%. this increase is
attributed to lack of awareness in the camps. With peace returning to the region, the possibility of an
increase in the prevalence rate is very likely. Frederick Womakuyu talks to some of the locals and
organisations working in the region

Seated on a papyrus mat, an elderly couple carefully examined two counter books. They seem to be
discussing the next family budget. But as I later learn, the two are clients to The AIDS Support
Organization (TASO), a charity offering Voluntary Counseling and Testing (VCT) to the people of northern
Uganda.

Fifty-nine-year-old Walter Owor is HIV–positive and attached to TASO. For four years, the father of two
has been receiving free treatment and training from TASO.
It is one of the routine voluntary counseling sessions Owor offers to Christine Auma – a 42 year-old
mother of two who tested HIV positive in 2004.

Owor knows that as the people of northern Uganda return home after two decades of the LRA conflict,
they have a real opportunity to transform their lives.

But the former soldier is also aware that this opportunity carries a new danger: the threat of an explosive
rise in HIV/AIDS.

“The next war northern Uganda will fight is HIV/AIDS. But it can be won if the government, along with
other stakeholders, acts now to focus on prevention, care and treatment,” he says.

Owor, who served in the Ugandan Army until 1991, and joined the teaching profession, says it is difficult
to tell how he got infected. “Some people associate HIV/AIDS with soldiers, but I wasn’t a reckless
soldier,” he says.“ I had two wives, but I didn’t drink or smoke.”

He says one of his wives was not stable. “She was on and off – going away for several days and
then back. I wanted to send her away but my father refused because I had children with her,” he said.

Owor says his health deteriorated in 1997 — he experienced many changes; whenever he went to the
garden, he felt tired. Although he suspected HIV/AIDS, Owor did not go for testing. “There was a lot of
stigma – knowing your status was like committing suicide.

He started experiencing boils and later rashes on the body, passing blood, diarrhoea and rushes on the
scrotum.
“I thought it was syphillis. I received continuous treatment in vain,” adding. “I wanted to test but
I feared. One day, a cousin who worked as a nurse encouraged me to test.”
That was in 2000. he was declared HIV positive. “At the time, TASO did not operate in Gulu and
access to ARVs was impossible,” he adds. “They tested my CD4 count, it was very low – I was
about to die. That’s when I went to Masindi for ARVs.”

At least he got better — but when he came back, he could neither return to his teaching job nor access
ARVs.

“It was a difficult situation – I was a teacher and because of the disease, they had struck me off the
payroll and everybody isolated me,” he said.
Owor found it difficult to get transfer documents so that he could access ARVs from Gulu.

“I don’t know why, but the group that was treating me in Masindi did not want me to leave. Maybe
it is a technique to access donor funds.”

After waiting for transfer documents for about a year, Owor was finally admitted to Gulu Medical Center in
August, 2007. “I started receiving ARVs and broke the silence about my status. Whenever people
come to talk about HIV/AIDS in seminars, I get involved.”

That is how TASO picked up Owor and trained him as a counselor – but Owor fears that after 23 years
in the camps, the situation might only get worse.

“HIV/AIDS continues to spread, food is not there and there is no transport or resources for me and
other counselors to move to the villages to create awareness.”

Owor’s fears are not baseless. According to a 2004 report by World Vision International, a local
charity, the HIV/AIDS infection rate in northern Uganda has reached alarming levels.
The report indicates that AIDS is the leading cause of death, contributing to 69% of death in Gulu district.
The national HIV/AIDS prevalence rate stands at 6.4%, but the rates in war–affected areas such as Gulu
were 11.9%, almost double the national average.

The conflict forced 1.7 million people to live in poverty, without health care and vulnerable to sexual
violence. According to the report, massive displacement left many people destitute with women finding
themselves with no other alternative but to engage in risky “survival sex” in exchange for food,
soap or money.

Young girls who left their homes at night to seek shelter in the towns often get raped. Dr. Peter Mwanga,
of World Relief Services International, says the emergence of peace has led to an increase in trade,
migration and travel – three of the main social vectors for transmission of HIV/AIDS.

“The 1.3 million Internally displaced persons are returning home. Many more people are traveling
freely to the region increasing the risk of rising rates of HIV/AIDS,” Mwanga warned. He said the civil
war may have prevented the spread of HIV/AIDS awareness.

“The region is ten years behind the rest of Uganda in terms of prevention awareness. Myths and
denial about the epidemic is rampant among the people,” he adds. “65% of the people do not know
a single method of prevention of the disease,” Mwanga said.

Due to the failing state of Uganda’s health system, combating HIV/AIDS will be an immense
challenge.

Dr. Mwanga said there is a lack of trained health personnel and shortage of equipment, medicine and
supplies.
“The shortage in the entire region is dire at 60 percent. Many clinics have neither midwives nor
adequate emergency obstetric services,” he said.
In Kitgum, at Mucwini health center III located inside an IDP camp, the NGO that originally built and
administered the center no longer had funding to provide health services and it was transferred to the
ministry of health.

At Paidongo parish Gulu, an area where returnees have just gone, the nearest health center is two hours
drive and the residents say that they have no way of reaching the center if they had an emergency.

The New Vision found that access to food is the most urgent need facing the displaced population. But
the need for food and health care are intertwined.

Many illnesses like HIV/AIDS in conjunction with a lack of food and adequate health services would pose
a severe obstacle for the reconstruction of the region.

However, there are some efforts by hospitals and charity groups battling the threat. Lacor hospital is one
of the government designated 21 national sentinel surveillance sites for monitoring HIV/AIDS.

It operates a very busy clinic and according to the hospital’s annual report 2006/2007, they treat about
80 patients daily on average.

“The prevalence at Lacor hospital for this year is at 10.9%. HIV prevalence trends are monitored based
on testing all pregnant mothers attending antenatal care for the first time,” the report says.

To date, over 10,000 patients have enrolled in Lacor AIDS clinic and about 6,000 are still being attended to
in the clinic with 1,802 patients on antiretroviral therapy, of which 173 are children below six years.

Owor says TASO is also accessing many patients and about 2,000 of them are receiving ARVs from TASO
in Gulu district, through trained clients like him.
But Mwanga warns that the people receiving ARVs are those staying in major towns.
“Now that the security situation has improved, the government and other stakeholders should extend
services to villages,” he said. “So far very few organisations are reaching the population in the
village.”

World Vision called for appropriate HIV/AIDS control measures to be incorporated into government, UN
and NGO programmes mean to alleviate the suffering of those affected by the conflict.

The government has launched prevention, care, and treatment programmes. It is also launching a sh120
billion rehabilitation programme in July 2009.

Although the money is meant for general reconstruction, the health system hasn’t been left behind –
recruitment of staff and construction of health centers has been catered for.
 NEW

USh 4,185,060 USh 366,520 USh 1,866,260

USh 2,614,260 USh 112,200 USh 2,614,260

Write Your New CV in 5

Minutes
ZETY
NEW

USh 1 866 260 USh 366 520 USh 2 614 260

All Rights Reserved © NewVision 2023

TV Contact us

Archives +256 (0)414 337 000

E-Papers +256 (0)312 337 000

Privacy Policy news@newvision.co.ug

Legal Policy 󰕄󰌻󰗃

Terms of Use