Africa Has 70 Per Cent of Patients Infected With AIDS

BRAZZAVILLE, 16 August 2010 (allAfrica.com) — At least 70 per cent of sick people in the world that are infected with AIDS are found in Africa.

This was said on Sunday by the regional director of the World Health Organisation (WHO) for Africa, the Angolan Luís Gomes Sambo.

Speaking to the press in Brazzaville City, Luís Gomes Sambo added that 80 per cent of patients that have malaria worldwide are in Africa.

Luís Gomes Sambo said that there is a big limitation of resources and he appealed to the African governments and traditional partners to secure support for health development.

According to him, AIDS and malaria are the main challenges for the health in Africa and their fight requires prevention, as well as the right treatment with the medicines of quality.

The director recognised the considerable progresses in the pharmaceutical research, though the anti-retroviral medicines are more effective, but he defended the need for continuous search for drugs that may heal the disease.

He stressed that there were some attempts in the field of the African traditional medicine through medicinal plants, but it was just palliative measures.

On the other hand, the director recalled that WHO has a programme for Angola, which is based on the reinforcement of the health system at the local and national level, in the improvement of the maternal and infant health, as well as in the prevention and fight against epidemic diseases.

Source: allafrica.com