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| HIV/AIDS counselor Florence Ngubani, left, briefs Albright
about the conditions at Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital in
Soweto, South Africa on Friday |
SOWETO, South
Africa (AP) -- Secretary of State Madeleine Albright toured a
South African AIDS research clinic Friday to draw attention to
the pandemic ravaging the continent and the effort to fight it.
"This
disease knows no boundaries, knows no particular people, it's
just an equality killer," she said. "What is important
is that finally the world is paying attention to the disease."
But more needs
to be done, she said as she toured the Perinatal HIV Research
Unit at Soweto's Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital. The unit is
one of 11 South African sites that receives U.S. funding for HIV
research.
The United
States is also providing $40 million over the next five years
to help South Africa increase awareness about the disease.
South Africa, with an estimated 4.2 million HIV-positive people,
has the largest population of HIV-infected people in the world.
Albright met
later in the day with South African President Thabo Mbeki, a discussion
expected to touch on the disease. Mbeki canceled a joint news
conference scheduled for after the meeting.
The South
African president has suffered withering international condemnation
for entertaining the views of fringe theorists who doubt the link
between HIV and AIDS and, in some cases, doubt the existence of
the disease at all. Official announced two months ago that Mbeki
would pull back from the AIDS debate.
South Africa
also has been criticized for refusing to provide anti-retroviral
medication to pregnant women to prevent the transmission of the
virus to their babies in childbirth. Recently, however, the government
gave conditional approval to the anti-retroviral drug nevirapine,
to be distributed to pregnant women.
Additionally,
South Africa agreed last week to accept a $50 million donation
from the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer of the drug fluconazole,
which treats meningitis and a debilitating throat inflammation
common among AIDS patients.
Health Minister
Manto Tshabalala-Msimang took steps against the stigma of HIV
last week by revealing that some of her friends and relatives
were infected.
Deputy Minister
Jacob Zuma on Wednesday admitted that despite the government's
efforts "the HIV/AIDS army marches on unchecked on its path
of destruction."
The government
had no choice but to change its tone, said Mark Heywood, director
of the AIDS Law Project.
"The
AIDS epidemic is becoming more and more in your face to quite
a number of people. People are dying, people are seeing people
dying, and there are senior politicians in the Cabinet who are
clearly now of the view that we must do something about it,"
he said.
Earlier Friday,
Albright met privately with Nobel Peace laureate Archbishop Desmond
Tutu in Cape Town and had breakfast with a group of female business
and government leaders.
Albright will
fly to the island nation of Mauritius on Saturday, then will stop
in Botswana. She also plans to travel to Algeria on Tuesday for
the signing of a peace treaty between Ethiopia and Eritrea, which
formally ends a two-year border war. She will then travel to Hungary
and Brussels.
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