US rock legend Carlos Santana joined the battle against South Africa’s Aids pandemic on Thursday, announcing he would donate more than three million dollars from an upcoming concert tour to fight the scourge.
Standing alongside South African Nobel Peace Prize laureate Bishop Desmond Tutu in Beverly Hills, California, Santana said he wanted to help spread a ”spiritual virus” of compassion towards Aids sufferers.
”Join us in spreading a spiritual virus,”’ the Grammy Award-winning guitarist told a press conference. ”A spiritual virus is very contagious.”
The guitarist said he would donate the cash from his 23-date US Shaman Tour, which begins in on June 13, to the Artists for a New South Africa’s Amandla Aids Fund (Ansa) to help fight the disease in Africa.
Tutu, the former longtime leader of South Africa’s Anglican Church who won the Nobel Prize in 1984, flew into Los Angeles to give his blessing to Santana’s crusade against Aids.
He said the musician’s ”staggering, staggering generosity” was ”almost inexpressible” and challenged the entertainment industry to follow suit.
”We overcame apartheid,” he said. ”You helped us overcome apartheid. We are going to overcome Aids.
”Pack out those concerts, man,” he told Santana, ”and make sure we get lots of money.”
Of the world’s 42-million Aids victims, 29-million live in sub-Saharan Africa and five million in South Africa alone, making it the worst affected country on earth, Ansa said.
Some 600 people die each day from Aids in South Africa, while another 1 600 contract HIV, it said.
Ansa was founded in Los Angeles in 1989 by Donna Brown Guillaume, wife of actor Robert Guillaume, actor Blair Underwood, singer CCH Pounder and actress Alfre Woodard.
The charity will use the cash raised by the concerts to buy medicines for those suffering from HIV or Aids, to care for Aids orphans and to prevent new infections through education, said its executive director Sharon Gelman said. – Sapa-AFP