Asia-Pacific nations must do more to fight HIV or face certain doom, a UN-backed group says.
The Asia-Pacific Coalition on Male Sexual Health told the world that India, Malaysia and many of their neighbors are not providing the education and resources necessary to curbing the virus. And their inactivity contributes to HIV’s frightening spread:
HIV infection rates in some Asia cities in the men who have sex with men (MSM) community are estimated to be as high as 32 percent, added the group, a coalition of U.N. bodies, governments and non-governmental organisations.
“One of the main reasons is stigma around engaging in MSM behaviour, and also identifying as gay, transgender and so on in Asia,” Edmund Settle, HIV/AIDS Programme Manager for the UNDP in China…”There’s also a legislative reason. In a lot of post-colonial countries such as India and Malaysia, engaging in male-to-male sex is illegal, punishable by long prison sentences. So it’s very difficult to talk openly about male-to-male sex if it’s illegal.”
That’s definitely true. It’s even more difficult to talk about same-sex sex when everyone’s dead.
Rt. Rev. Dr. RES
Subsaharan Africa still suffers from the artificial European colonial divisions. Britain and France had multiple colonies -plural – in order to artifically divide warring tribes into majority/minority entities they could control since they were so busy fighting each other.
Belgium and Portugal were also colonial powers after WWI when the Germans ceded their colonies to the two major Allied Powers.
When independence started with the Gold Coast in 1959, majority native strongmen started their dictatorial rule over their majority while often genociding their minority.
In the seventies, after most if not all of the colonies had become independent, there was a movement to realign the borders to pre-colonial realities. It failed. The Churches tried to broker this deal, but to limited success.
Kamerun was a German colony divided into both British and French Cameroon colonies after WWI. When both gained independence, the colonies merged into one independent country. This is an exception. Two majority tribes now inhabit the nation.
As you know, many nations have also half-Christian and half-Islamic populations and cultures. AIDS is one pandemic with many facets, and that includes the belief that all adultery is immoral and illegal, and in Shari’a law, punishable by death.
Africa is ruled by strong dictators who are the ultimate planetary fascists. The Union of South Africa is the notable exception that includes same sex marriage. Lesotho, a postage stamp kingdom in the middle of that country, reminds all South Africans that their country is indeed exceptional.