NELSON Mandela was again a lone voice this week as he threw his weight behind the fight for a tuberculosis-free Africa. Endorsing the launch of a public/private partnership between the Nelson Mandela Foundation and Aventis pharmaceuticals to fight the epidemic, he joked that the president and the deputy president were ”too busy to attend”. They were overseas.
Speaking to journalists, diplomats and a small panel of government officials, he said Minister of Education Kader Asmal had been scheduled to attend but had sent a message shortly before the launch to say that he was in Cape Town and could not make it to Johannesburg.
Mandela, who was treated for the disease while in prison, laughed off Asmal’s cancellation, joking that the minister had not had the courage to tell him directly and had told his secretary.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has declared tuberculosis a global emergency. It estimates that an additional billion people will be infected over the next 20 years, with 22 high-burden countries accounting for 80% of that figure. It is also estimated that 35-million of those infected will die
of the disease.
South Africa is ranked ninth on the list of the high-burden countries. The curable disease kills an average of 36 people every day in South Africa and, with just 60% of sufferers cured, the country falls well short of the WHO’s target cure rate of 85%.
France-based Aventis has committed ?15-million (R146-million), to be donated over five years, to help rid Africa of TB.
In place of the Minister of Health, Dr Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, who was also unable to attend because she was in the United States, Gauteng’s MEC for Health Dr Gwen Ramokgopa said: ”Health services alone cannot reduce the incidence of TB in our country.”
Speaking of the importance of state initiatives with the private sector she said: ”We are not yet moving strongly and rapidly enough to send this deadly epidemic into reverse.”
Urging ”reason and understanding to keep children from dying”, Mandela said he was ”relieved” the government had changed its policy on HIV/Aids.
He praised companies such as Microsoft, McDonald’s and Ericcson for their contributions to the Nelson Mandela Foundation and highlighted talk-show host Oprah Winfrey’s contribution of $10-million to fund the building of a school for women. He urged young South Africans to become proactive to ”tackle the problems of our country”.
Mandela put his cure of TB down to early detection, a good diet and closely monitored treatment. One of the main causes of death from TB is patients failing to complete their treatment. The Direct Observed Therapy, Short-Course (Dots) system is a programme whereby patients have a supporter who ensures that they complete their medication courses.
The WHO says the system results in a 95% cure rate. Currently only 23% of patients in South Africa use Dots and when they do there are 20 patients for each supporter.
Aventis’s donation will be used to build nine ”centres of excellence”, one in each province, which will focus on the Dots method and will be used to train carers, to plan and measure pilot TB projects and to increase TB awareness and education.