AIDS battle harmed by brain drain

The brain drain of Africa's nurses to the West is hurting Lesotho's fight against HIV/AIDS, said Stephen Lewis, the UN special envoy for AIDS in Africa. However, despite its efforts being hobbled by the loss of skills, the government was single-mindedly determined to tackle the pandemic. At the end of his recent visit to the tiny mountain kingdom, Lewis pointed out, "The problem now is human capacity. Lesotho has a problem of nurses ... like other African countries, it is struggling with the brain drain to countries such as Britain and Canada". The country has some 100,000 AIDS orphans and an estimated 30 percent of adults are HIV-positive.