Everybody's talking about sex these days in sub-Saharan Africa. Ask any child of school age and the chances are they'll be aware of the mechanics of the act and able to explain why sex and death are linked so closely here.
It never used to be like this. There was plenty of sex about -- monogamous sex, polygamous sex, sex between a widow and her dead husband's brother to "cleanse" her of any evil spirits associated with her departed spouse, and initiation rites of girls and boys on reaching puberty -- it just wasn't discussed very much.
In those innocent days before AIDS, and when it was here but we didn't know what it was and attributed its deaths to malaria or witchcraft or Satan, we all had sex without fear.
Now everyone knows what AIDS is, and although many of the estimated 29.4 million people in sub-Saharan Africa living with the virus never take an HIV test, we have come to recognise the coughs, the rashes, the diarrhoea and the wasting that always ends in death. With knowledge has come a terrible fear. The sheer volume of deaths -- 15 million to date -- now openly attributed to AIDS conveys a stronger public health message than any poster ever could.
In an ideal world children shouldn't have to know about sex until they're preparing to join the world of adults. They should be able to learn about it as a physical expression of love and commitment rather than as a potential death sentence. But too many of the blissfully ignorant generation who grew up in the 1970s and 1980s have paid for their innocence with their lives. The naivety of childhood is a luxury the west can afford, but we have to get pragmatic.
For the babies who are infected with HIV by their mothers, it is generally too late. Most do not survive beyond the age of two. For many adults sick with AIDS, it is also too late unless they happen to be in that tiny group -- less than 1 percent in this part of the world -- who have access to anti-retroviral drugs (ARVs). But for the children there is still time.
We call the five-to-15 age group the generation of hope. They have the lowest HIV rates of the entire population, and they can turn the AIDS pandemic around. Until now they have been largely ignored when it comes to AIDS education, but if we can "reach them and teach them," they will be able to protect not only themselves but the next generation.
I work in Zambia for a relief and development agency, and we know that because survival has become so fragile, our strongest hope lies with our children. So we never stop talking about sex. Stating bluntly to children that sex is the primary transmission route for AIDS -- at an age when their parents didn't know what sex is -- is a vital way to inoculate them against the "genocide by virus" that is all around us.
At school we work with them before they become sexually active, before the sexual peer pressure of adolescence kicks in. Along with parents, if they are still alive, we discuss their sexuality, self-image and self-esteem. Together we work on ways to communicate with peers and family members, focusing on methods of negotiation so they don't end up having sex when they don't want it or having unsafe sex because they don't know how to insist on using a condom.
The church is working closely with us. At first pastors didn't want to be associated with the stigma of AIDS -- it was viewed as a punishment for promiscuity. But now they are responding compassionately and effectively, broadcasting the ABC message: Abstinence, Be faithful or Condoms.
Of course, turning our children into vigilant AIDS experts won't solve our problems on its own. In Zambia we have been allocated money from the Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, but we haven't yet seen the money reach those who need it most. If we can get the drugs to the sick parents with young children, they may have another five to 10 years of life, allowing them to see the children through their childhoods and help to head off what one government official predicts will be "a total breakdown in social cohesion" caused by the increasingly absent generation of 20-to 45-year-olds.
In the affluent west, AIDS has been transformed from a death sentence into a chronic manageable condition. Donating the cost of a few days' military spending in your part of the world could do the same for us. Give us a helping hand and we can attack AIDS on all fronts. Cancel our crippling debts so that we can plough back any wealth we generate into our own economies. And give us access to free ARVs that will increase the number of people with the strength to build up our shattered economy.
Don't let the generation of hope become a second lost generation.
Lillian Daka is an HIV/AIDS development facilitator for World Vision Zambia
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