30 September 2021
HIV-AIDS/Covid: The Covid pandemic is threatening/has reversed already achieved progress against HIV-AIDS and is worsening inequality. According to UNAIDS Executive Director Winnie Byanyima, “(b)oth COVID-19 and HIV are feeding off inequalities: women whose rights are not respected; women who do not have economic security or access to the most basic health or education services. These are the people that pay the heaviest price of our inaction on inequality. They pay the price in insecurity, in poverty, in sickness, and too often in death.” Amongst adolescents, more than 80% newly acquiring HIV are girls – because they do not have the power to define the circumstances of having sex. And while the risk of acquiring HIV is reduced by half for girls completing secondary education (and even more by a complementary package in rights and services), it is sectors like education and girls’ empowerment which are suffering budget cuts because of the financial consequences of the COVID pandemic.
https://theconversation.com/head-of-unaids-unpacks-the-knock-on-effects-of-covid-19-and-what-needs-to-be-done-168909
29 September 2021
Covid: Congo-Kinshasa has 0.1 vaccinations per 100 inhabitants, Burkina Faso 0.8, South Africa 28.4, Zimbabwe 35.1, Tunisia 62.5 and Morocco 109.1 – the continent’s overall average is 10.8 (with 4 out of 100 fully vaccinated), 148 million vaccinations having been administered to the 1.37 billion Africans.
https://theconversation.com/want-to-know-about-vaccine-rollouts-in-africa-click-on-a-country-here-and-find-out-168621