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photogenxStephen Lewis brings to light the AIDS pandemic in Africa shortly after it started to ravage the continent. Lewis focuses a great deal on the devastating effects AIDS has on Africa, primarily the effect it has on the children. The children of Africa are the most venerable, they have been orphaned and traumatized by AIDS and are slowly being forgotten. These children have no one to look after them and desperately need our help.
The Africa that Lewis new when he first visited in 1960 was just coming into independence and “the sense of possibility was everywhere.” Children got to go to school, there was food and although Africa was poor it was not in the state of starvation that it is in now. The people of Africa were full of life and opportunity. Lewis recalls, “That innocence, that absence of malice, or prejudice or intolerance (i.e., anti-Semitism) was one of the most heartwarming characteristics of the new Ghana-indeed, of all African countries in the immediate flowering of liberation” (375-376). Africa was thriving; it was dreaming big dreams and planning for the future, but Africa as well as Lewis was not expecting AIDS.
AIDS came in and took over Africa. Lewis describes the state of the African countries affected by AIDS. “Southern Africa is the terrifying epicenter, East Africa, including Ethiopia, is in serious straits, central Africa is struggling, and only West Africa seems able to contain the virus” (378). Devastated by AIDS and the horrific affect it is having on his beloved country, Lewis relates to his audience a time in 2002 when he was “visiting the Lilongwe Central Hospital in the capital of Malawi.” He entered the adult medical wing and says it was like a “picture right out of Dante. There were two people to every bed…some under the bed on the concrete floor, each in an agony of full-blown AIDS” (378-379). Although AIDS is not the only problem in Africa, there is also a huge shortage of food.
Lewis writes, “Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, Lesotho, Swaziland, and Mozambique have all suffered terrible droughts over the last several years, and the drought cum pandemic have added up to starvation. But it's more then that. It’s hard to go anywhere on the continent without people crying for food. In fact, if you ask almost anyone what they need most, including people suffering from full-blown AIDS, they will not say drugs; they will say food. It’s a universal reply” (383). Hunger and AIDS are terrible enough to deal with by themselves, but together they are a nightmare. A person suffering from AIDS who is also malnourished and starving cannot be treated. “The body can’t handle the drugs without food” (384) but if the body is properly nourished “AIDS can sometimes be forestalled for a considerable period of time” (384). AIDS would not have the death grip it has on Africa right now if Africa was able to feed its people. Lewis has a soft spot for the people of Africa, especially its children. They captured his heart over his many visits and now he is doing his utmost to help them.
As of 2009 there were 16.6 million children orphaned by AIDS worldwide, 15 million of those were in sub-Saharan Africa alone. These children are emotionally neglected and traumatized by having to care for their parents and then watch helplessly as they waste away and die from AIDS. Since there is usually no one to take care of these newly orphaned children the eldest sibling takes over as head of the house, many of whom are as young as 8, and have to look after 3 or 4 siblings. Their little worlds are filled with death and despair; they have no hope or big dreams for the future. They cannot go to school nor do anything a regular child would be able to do. Lewis talked to the eldest child in an orphan sibling family asking, “Who puts you to bed at night?” “I put everyone to bed,” she replied. “But bedtime can be pretty scary,” I offered. “The nights are dark, the dreams can be upsetting. Don’t any of your neighbors come in to help?” “No,” she said, matter-of-factly. “I put them to bed myself. I’m the mother” (382). This wonderful little girl is only 14, her four siblings she takes care of; are 12, 11, 10, and 8. “In Swaziland, it’s expected that up to 15 percent of the entire population will be orphaned by 2010” (382). It is now 2011. Throughout his essay, Lewis cannot stress enough the plight that Africa’s children are in. He witnessed a meeting where a member of the Swaziland cabinet during the meeting “discussing matters of public policy….suddenly jumped to his feet; impatient and agitated. “Forget about this policy stuff,” he said, his voice rising. “Don’t you understand that we are a nation of orphans? That we have hundreds of child-headed households in Swaziland, where the age of the child heading that household is eight?” (382) These orphans have no one to look after them or mother them or love them. All they have is each other and sometimes even that gets taken away from them. Lewis is brokenhearted by the state of Africa and especially by the state of its children. He cannot believe that “there is no master plan for the children orphaned by AIDS” (383). They are left to ruff it on their own, unless by some chance a grandmother is still alive.
The Grandmothers of Africa in Lewis’ opinion are the unsung heroes. They go through so much yet they keep their heads up and do what they have to for their grandchildren. “These old and unimaginably frail women often look after five or ten or fifteen kids, enduring every considerable hardship for the sake of their grandchildren, alongside additional numbers of other abandoned waifs who wonder the landscape of the continent. The trauma of the grandmothers equals that of the orphans; in fact every normal rhythm of life is violated as grandmothers bury their own children and then look after their orphaned grandchildren” (380). These grandmothers do way more than they ever should and are put through an emotional hell that none of us can even imagine. But Lewis is concerned about what happens to the orphans when the grandmothers die. What happens to those whose grandmothers are already dead?
Canada and the United States are actually doing a lot to help slow and ultimately stop the transmission of the HIV-AIDS virus. They are promoting and funding programs and organizations like MSF (Doctors Without Borders), PMTCT (Prevention of Mother-to-Child Transition) and WFP (World Food Program). These programs are wonderful and are helping a great deal to make Africa aware of how the virus is spread and how they can prevent it from spreading. At a UN “high level meeting on AIDS, world leaders committed to a global action plan that will make significant strides towards elimination new HIV infections among children by 2015 and keeping their mothers alive.” This sounds like a great goal and a potential victory, but it does not address the issue of what are we going to do for the orphans now. According to www.avert.org/aids-orphans.htm, “even with the expansion of antiretroviral treatment access it is estimated that by 2015 the number of orphaned children will still be overwhelmingly high.”
Lewis is telling North America that it needs to do something for the orphans. He acknowledges that they are doing a great job of helping with relief, but feels that to beat AIDS the world needs to be brought to care about every aspect of it. Once that happens then “Africa could be brought back to the life it once had” (389).
The Africa that Lewis new when he first visited in 1960 was just coming into independence and “the sense of possibility was everywhere.” Children got to go to school, there was food and although Africa was poor it was not in the state of starvation that it is in now. The people of Africa were full of life and opportunity. Lewis recalls, “That innocence, that absence of malice, or prejudice or intolerance (i.e., anti-Semitism) was one of the most heartwarming characteristics of the new Ghana-indeed, of all African countries in the immediate flowering of liberation” (375-376). Africa was thriving; it was dreaming big dreams and planning for the future, but Africa as well as Lewis was not expecting AIDS.
AIDS came in and took over Africa. Lewis describes the state of the African countries affected by AIDS. “Southern Africa is the terrifying epicenter, East Africa, including Ethiopia, is in serious straits, central Africa is struggling, and only West Africa seems able to contain the virus” (378). Devastated by AIDS and the horrific affect it is having on his beloved country, Lewis relates to his audience a time in 2002 when he was “visiting the Lilongwe Central Hospital in the capital of Malawi.” He entered the adult medical wing and says it was like a “picture right out of Dante. There were two people to every bed…some under the bed on the concrete floor, each in an agony of full-blown AIDS” (378-379). Although AIDS is not the only problem in Africa, there is also a huge shortage of food.
Lewis writes, “Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, Lesotho, Swaziland, and Mozambique have all suffered terrible droughts over the last several years, and the drought cum pandemic have added up to starvation. But it's more then that. It’s hard to go anywhere on the continent without people crying for food. In fact, if you ask almost anyone what they need most, including people suffering from full-blown AIDS, they will not say drugs; they will say food. It’s a universal reply” (383). Hunger and AIDS are terrible enough to deal with by themselves, but together they are a nightmare. A person suffering from AIDS who is also malnourished and starving cannot be treated. “The body can’t handle the drugs without food” (384) but if the body is properly nourished “AIDS can sometimes be forestalled for a considerable period of time” (384). AIDS would not have the death grip it has on Africa right now if Africa was able to feed its people. Lewis has a soft spot for the people of Africa, especially its children. They captured his heart over his many visits and now he is doing his utmost to help them.
As of 2009 there were 16.6 million children orphaned by AIDS worldwide, 15 million of those were in sub-Saharan Africa alone. These children are emotionally neglected and traumatized by having to care for their parents and then watch helplessly as they waste away and die from AIDS. Since there is usually no one to take care of these newly orphaned children the eldest sibling takes over as head of the house, many of whom are as young as 8, and have to look after 3 or 4 siblings. Their little worlds are filled with death and despair; they have no hope or big dreams for the future. They cannot go to school nor do anything a regular child would be able to do. Lewis talked to the eldest child in an orphan sibling family asking, “Who puts you to bed at night?” “I put everyone to bed,” she replied. “But bedtime can be pretty scary,” I offered. “The nights are dark, the dreams can be upsetting. Don’t any of your neighbors come in to help?” “No,” she said, matter-of-factly. “I put them to bed myself. I’m the mother” (382). This wonderful little girl is only 14, her four siblings she takes care of; are 12, 11, 10, and 8. “In Swaziland, it’s expected that up to 15 percent of the entire population will be orphaned by 2010” (382). It is now 2011. Throughout his essay, Lewis cannot stress enough the plight that Africa’s children are in. He witnessed a meeting where a member of the Swaziland cabinet during the meeting “discussing matters of public policy….suddenly jumped to his feet; impatient and agitated. “Forget about this policy stuff,” he said, his voice rising. “Don’t you understand that we are a nation of orphans? That we have hundreds of child-headed households in Swaziland, where the age of the child heading that household is eight?” (382) These orphans have no one to look after them or mother them or love them. All they have is each other and sometimes even that gets taken away from them. Lewis is brokenhearted by the state of Africa and especially by the state of its children. He cannot believe that “there is no master plan for the children orphaned by AIDS” (383). They are left to ruff it on their own, unless by some chance a grandmother is still alive.
The Grandmothers of Africa in Lewis’ opinion are the unsung heroes. They go through so much yet they keep their heads up and do what they have to for their grandchildren. “These old and unimaginably frail women often look after five or ten or fifteen kids, enduring every considerable hardship for the sake of their grandchildren, alongside additional numbers of other abandoned waifs who wonder the landscape of the continent. The trauma of the grandmothers equals that of the orphans; in fact every normal rhythm of life is violated as grandmothers bury their own children and then look after their orphaned grandchildren” (380). These grandmothers do way more than they ever should and are put through an emotional hell that none of us can even imagine. But Lewis is concerned about what happens to the orphans when the grandmothers die. What happens to those whose grandmothers are already dead?
Canada and the United States are actually doing a lot to help slow and ultimately stop the transmission of the HIV-AIDS virus. They are promoting and funding programs and organizations like MSF (Doctors Without Borders), PMTCT (Prevention of Mother-to-Child Transition) and WFP (World Food Program). These programs are wonderful and are helping a great deal to make Africa aware of how the virus is spread and how they can prevent it from spreading. At a UN “high level meeting on AIDS, world leaders committed to a global action plan that will make significant strides towards elimination new HIV infections among children by 2015 and keeping their mothers alive.” This sounds like a great goal and a potential victory, but it does not address the issue of what are we going to do for the orphans now. According to www.avert.org/aids-orphans.htm, “even with the expansion of antiretroviral treatment access it is estimated that by 2015 the number of orphaned children will still be overwhelmingly high.”
Lewis is telling North America that it needs to do something for the orphans. He acknowledges that they are doing a great job of helping with relief, but feels that to beat AIDS the world needs to be brought to care about every aspect of it. Once that happens then “Africa could be brought back to the life it once had” (389).
(no subject)
Date: 2011-09-29 05:16 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-10-05 02:14 am (UTC)