Search
  1. Home
  2. Southern Africa
  3. Zimbabwe

Mandatory HIV testing given a miss

    JOHANNESBURG

    Zimbabwe on Tuesday rejected a call by NGOs to make HIV testing compulsory, saying it constituted a violation of human rights.

    The deputy minister of health and child welfare, Edwin Muguti, said every Zimbabwean had the right to individually decide on their health.

    "People should be left to make informed decisions and not to be forced to expose their status against their will," he told the local Herald newspaper.

    Muguti was confident that voluntary counselling and testing were already yielding the desired results.

    Zimbabwe recently became the first Southern African nation to report a drop in prevalence from 24.6 percent in 2003 to 20.1 percent in 2005.

    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

    Share this article

    Our ability to deliver compelling, field-based reporting on humanitarian crises rests on a few key principles: deep expertise, an unwavering commitment to amplifying affected voices, and a belief in the power of independent journalism to drive real change.

    We need your help to sustain and expand our work. Your donation will support our unique approach to journalism, helping fund everything from field-based investigations to the innovative storytelling that ensures marginalised voices are heard.

    Please consider joining our membership programme. Together, we can continue to make a meaningful impact on how the world responds to crises.

    Become a member of The New Humanitarian

    Support our journalism and become more involved in our community. Help us deliver informative, accessible, independent journalism that you can trust and provides accountability to the millions of people affected by crises worldwide.

    Join