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Course helps traditional healers fight AIDS

    JOHANNESBURG

    Some 200 traditional healers in South Africa's port city of Durban have completed a course to strengthen their role in the fight against HIV/AIDS, the South African Broadcasting Corporation reported.

    The training, funded by the US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief to the tune of $700,000, would enable practitioners, for the first time, to document the health of their patients, and refer them to clinics and hospitals if their health did not improve.

    Course delegates were also equipped with medical kits containing gloves, condoms, dustbins and scales to apply the knowledge gained during training.

    The department of health said the initiative could go national, depending on how well the delegates applied their new knowledge in their practices.

    An estimated 80 percent of South Africans still consult traditional healers, despite the ongoing conflict of views among medical professionals over African versus conventional medicine.

    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

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