March 18, 2008
Admitting to being HIV-positive is a
difficult task for anyone. It's
even more difficult for the African
bogus faith healers of the deadly
virus particularly those Christian
evangelists and pagans, who claim they
cure the destructive epidemic by
prescribing sex with albinos, the
disabled or virgins as a cure for HIV
and Aids.
African Christian evangelistic
workers often present themselves as
local heroes and almost-saints who
face no obstacle without overcoming,
but David Balubenze was faced with some special
challenges as the pastor of
Deliverance Church Nankandulo, in
Kamuli, about 100km from the Ugandan
capital, Kampala.
Balubenze knew he was HIV-positive for
a year before he told church elders,
and it was several more years before
he informed his congregation. "My fear
was that if I tell them, maybe they
will abandon the church," Balubenze
said.
The catalyst for his disclosure came
after attending a 2004 meeting in
Mukono, Uganda, of the African Network
of Religious Leaders living with or
personally affected by HIV/Aids (Anerela).
In Mukono, Balubenze met Anerela's
founder, Canon Gideon Byamugisha, who
in 1992 became the first African
religious leader to declare publicly
that he was living with HIV.
Byamugisha started Anerela in 2003
with the goal of creating a support
network for HIV-positive religious
leaders that would help them discuss
their status and inform their
congregation about the virus.
By the end of 2006, Anerela had more
than 2 000 members in 39 African
countries. The Uganda chapter of
Anerela (Unerela), has about 245
members, including at least 40
religious leaders who are living
openly with HIV/Aids.
According to Gabriel Amori, the
national coordinator of Unerela and a
church deacon, Byamugisha's
groundbreaking disclosure has changed
the way Ugandans think about Aids.
"HIV used to be seen as a disease
caused by sin," he said. "For Canon
Gideon to boldly come out and say he
is living with the virus was an
indication that to have HIV/Aids is a
disease like any other."
Through Unerela, Balubenze learned
more about the disease's epidemiology,
and how to approach HIV/Aids
discussions with congregants and
colleagues.
Before he made his disclosure in 2005,
he asked his congregation a series of
questions aimed at emphasising their
own susceptibility to the virus. "All
of us are at risk [from contracting
HIV]," he told them.
Afterwards, Balubenze said many people
in his church sought his advice. Some
asked where and how to test for HIV,
while others enquired about the side
effects of antiretroviral drugs (ARVs),
implying that they too were living
with HIV.
Religion and HIV education About 85% of Africans belong to some
kind of religious community - Muslims,
Christians and traditionalists, making
places of worship ideal venues for
HIV/Aids education.
"Christianity reaches more people than
healthcare," said Stephen Waititi, a
former church deacon and the medical
director of Milmay Centre, an HIV/Aids
clinic in Kampala.
"When we train religious leaders, we
train a nation," Balubenze said.
"Their words are final and whatever
religious leaders tell their
congregations is taken as truth."
While religious leaders living with
HIV/Aids in Uganda still face
discrimination, Amori believes the
situation has improved. "In the past,
because of stigma, we've had religious
leaders dying in silence," he said.
Byamugisha recalled how some of his
congregants had refused to accept
communion from him after he first
announced his status.
Some of the religious leaders
belonging to Unerela are open about
their HIV status with their family
members and those close to them, but
have still not disclosed to their
congregants.
Recognising that it takes time for
people to come to terms with their
status, Unerela allows new members to
join the organisation as religious
leaders affected by HIV/Aids without
having to disclose their own status.
Balubenze, however, now tries to be as
public as possible about his status --
even ensuring that his ARVs are
delivered to his home in a well-marked
car from The Aids Support Organisation,
a local NGO providing HIV/Aids
services.
He would like to see more religious
leaders living openly with the virus.
"If there is enough sensitisation and
medicine," he said, "the time will
come when we say, 'Once upon a time
there was HIV/Aids.'"
African lawmakers began examined in
the last week draft legislation aimed
to rid HIV and Aids-plagued Malawi of
pastoral quacks claiming to cure the
virus through such remedies as sex
with virgins, health authorities said.
"When it passes into law, all
traditional healers claiming to cure
Aids will be dealt with," Mary Shaba,
head of HIV and Aids issues for
Malawi's health ministry, told a
parliamentary committee asked to
provide input to the measure before it
is submitted to the full 193-member
parliament later in 2008.
"The Act will regulate and protect
people from healers who prescribe sex
with albinos, the disabled or virgins
as a cure for HIV and Aids," she said
of the bill drafted in collaboration
with traditional Malawi healers and
the World Health Organisation.
Shaba did not specify possible
sanctions against bogus pastors
healing claims for a virus that has
devastated this southern African
country, infecting more than one in 10
people.
African bogus healers, including
Chritian envagelists, demanded to be
recognised as competent for the
treatment of Aids and to be involved
in research into the disease. The
HIV/AIDS epidemics spreading through
the countries of Sub-saharan Africa
are highly varied. Although it is not
correct to speak of a single African
epidemic, Africa is without doubt the
region most affected by the virus.
Inhabited by just over 12% of the
world's population, Africa is
estimated to have more than 60% of the
AIDS-infected population.
Much of the deadliness of the epidemic
in Sub-Saharan Africa has to do with a
deadly synergy between HIV and
Tuberculosis. In fact, Tuberculosis is
the world's greatest infectious killer
of women of reproductive age and the
leading cause of death among people
with HIV/AIDS.
The African Christian and pagan
sew-with-virgins Aids healers said at
the end of a one-day workshop on
traditional medicine at the Lusaka
conference on Aids in Africa that
policy-makers should recognise the
importance of traditional medicine.
Under the Malawi draft legislation,
the country's 30 000 traditional
healers - many of whom operate in
towns and villages where hospitals are
few and far between - would be
required to register with a board set
up by the health ministry.
In 2007, a United Nations-funded study
found that about 60 percent of people
aged between 15 and 49 lacked
knowledge about HIV prevention.
Prevalence measures include everyone
living with HIV and AIDS, and present
a delayed representation of the
epidemic by aggregating the HIV
infections of many years. Incidence,
in contrast, measures the number of
new infections, usually over the
previous year. There is no practical,
reliable way to assess incidence in
sub-Saharan Africa. Prevalence in
15–24 year old pregnant women
attending antenatal clinics is
sometimes used as an approximation;
these measurements are called
serosurveys.
Some 80 percent of Africans are
believed to consult either Chritian
evangelical or traditional healers for
treatment of almost any illness. |
