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Signs of the Times Australia / NZ edition — lifestyle, health, relationships, culture, spirituality, people — published since 1886 |
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Signs of the Times Australia / NZ edition — lifestyle, health, relationships, culture, spirituality, people — published since 1886 |
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AIDS is serious. “In Africa, 34 million people are infected with HIV; 13 million are orphans. Every minute two people contract the HIV virus; and 90 per cent of these are children. The number-one mode of transmission is not through homosexual activities but from mother to infant,” write editors Jenny Eaton and Kate Etue, introducing The aWAKE Project, a collection of responses to this emerging crisis.
In late 1980, a San Francisco doctor noticed a patient with an unusual respiratory infection. Over the following months, he saw a number of other patients with similar symptoms and reported this new disease. It was the discovery of a new disease that has—and will—change the world.
Last year, during a lunch hosted by the Department of Religious Studies of Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, guests were reflecting on the inadequacy of Christian and Western response to the AIDS pandemic. For example, recent research reports less than 3 per cent of US Christians are willing to financially help a Christian organisation minister to an AIDS orphan. At this gathering, The aWAKE Project was born—“aWAKE” standing for “AIDS: Working toward Awareness, Knowledge and Engagement.”
The resulting book is an eclectic collection. The 41 contributors include politicians, musicians, athletes, writers, actors, activists and Christian leaders—all of whom have waived their rights to royalties, with all proceeds from the book going to appropriate charity organisations.
This variety of personalities includes Nelson Mandela, Bono, Kofi Annan, George W Bush, Tony Campolo and Philip Yancey. As such, the book covers a broad range of political and religious thought, brought together to create awareness and highlight the need for significant action to combat AIDS and its spread.
With about 70 per cent of HIV infections to be found in Africa, this is the focus of The aWAKE Project. Resources are desperately needed to fight the disease itself, but also attention must be given to the underlying conditions that contribute to the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa—poverty, starvation, civil unrest, limited access to health care, meagre education systems and other infectious diseases.
It seems the world is losing the fight against AIDS. There is neither a cure nor a vaccine. Yet there are treatments that suppress the disease, there are tests to identify those infected and there are treatments available to reduce risks of mothers passing the disease to their babies. With sufficient commitment, the experts are confident the tide of AIDS can be turned.
Of course, the United States is a particular target for criticism in its unresponsiveness to human need while “spending tens of billions of dollars fighting a war on terrorism that tragically claimed a few thousand lives,” yet spending less than 1 per cent of that amount in “a war against AIDS that kills more than 5000 Africans each day.”
However, all governments, community groups, churches and individuals in developed countries need to recognise and respond to the AIDS reality.
The aWAKE Project is harrowing reading—but it is a start. The book is divided into sections reflecting the three aims: awareness, knowledge and engagement. The third section suggests possible outlets for the discomfort and need to respond that the book engenders. There are practical steps individuals, community groups and churches can take to have an impact on the AIDS crisis. These include prayer suggestions, further sources of information, getting involved with existing organisations, political lobbying and projects or sponsorships in which your community group or church can become involved.
We cannot ignore AIDS: “Every day lost is a day when ten thousand more people become infected with HIV.”
The aWAKE Project: Uniting Against the African AIDS Crisis, Jenny Eaton and Kate Etue (Editors), W Publishing, 297 pages.
Extract from Signs of the Times, September 2003.
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