titusonenine » Uganda beating the odds on AIDS: “Uganda beating the odds on AIDS

‘Do you want to explore a country of 26.4 million tribespeople that went through horrendous dictatorships, the struggle to reconstitute itself and the stupefying undertaking of rebuilding itself – and that has virtually controlled the worst disease in modern history? Welcome to Uganda.

Ten years ago, after the fall of the dictatorships of Idi Amin and Milton Obote, the progressive government of President Yoweri Museveni suddenly awoke to a startling fact: Fully 30 percent of Uganda’s people had AIDS. The country was, quite literally, dying.

‘Why did the president act so quickly?’ said Professor Peter N. Mugyenyi, now director of the Joint Clinical Research Centre. ‘He had to. There was the sheer horror of the disease itself. There was not a family that had not lost a member – and thank God that he took his decisions.’

Those decisions meant an all-out fight against AIDS, from admonishing the people against sexual promiscuity to destigmatizing and demystifying the disease (a careful balancing act); from radio announcements to billboards, to school programs, to research and importing every kind of treatment – against all the odds….’”

(Via Kendall Harmon’s Blog.)