Ghana hosts african meeting on AIDS

A five-day African meeting opened Tuesday here to strengthen the preventive capacity of African countries in responding to HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs).

Twenty-five experts from six countries, including Ghana Tanzania, Uganda and South Africa, are attending the encounter

seeking to set a strategy to combat the killer disease and alleviate the sufferings of HIV patients, Pan-African News Agency reported.

Representatives from international agencies such as the World Bank, European Union, UN Agency for AIDS (UNAIDS) and other UN agencies are also attending the meeting which would review the possibility of implementing regional STDs programme.

Addressing the meeting, a WHO regional representative said AIDS is now a leading cause of death in Africa, replacing malaria and other communicable diseases.

In 1997, he said, it was estimated that 2.3 million people died of AIDS worldwide which represents a 50 % increase compared to 1996.He also affirmed that "one distressing fact is that about 90 % of these infections are found in Africa."