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The Burundi government says although the HIV infection prevalence in the urban areas has stabilised at 18.6 percent, it is still concerned by the level of infection in rural areas.
At 1 percent in 1990, HIV prevalence in the rural areas was 7.5 percent by 2000, the minister for HIV/AIDS issues, Genevieve Sindabizera, told IRIN on Monday. She attributed the rise to the high level of promiscuity in camps for the displaced, which host some 432,000 people, and to lack of information on the disease.
The government had, therefore, taken steps to control the scourge, which in Burundi mostly affects people aged between 15 years and 25 years. The government is strengthening its capacity to provide HIV/AIDS information, employing HIV preventive measures and providing drugs to the victims, Dr Joseph Wakana, who head the nation's HIV/AIDS secretariat, told IRIN on Monday.
The economic impact of the HIV/AIDS pandemic has been dramatic in a country with an annual per capita income of US $140. It costs hospital authorities $832 to treat an AIDS-infected person up to the point of death.
"If AIDS continues at this rate, the projection is that by 2010 life expectancy will drop below 40 years, compared to 60 years if there were no AIDS," Wakana said.
This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions