There Is An African 'President' Who 'Cures' AIDS?
The pandemic is still ravaging Africa. Gone are those days when the death of a relative or friend was attributed to some 'witchcraft' caused by some relative or friend. People of my age group who happen not have been contracted the virus HIV that causes AIDS have no reason to attribute credits to their morality. We are all affected by AIDS even if we are not infected.
The problem in Africa is our attitude towards a pandemic whose origins, though woven in a cluster of controversy, is a reality with us. AIDS is everywhere today, but in Africa, the pandemic is exacerbated by extreme poverty. The youth who face a very uncertain future are most affected.
Africa's quest for a cure to this pandemic has been multi-faceted. Academic research minds are at work , and some have even claimed to have discovered the cure for this pandemic. Traditional herbalists have come up with all kinds of concoction claiming to 'cure' or 'treat' the virus. Pentecostal pastors and other men of God promise healing through miraculous ways.
Even though the Anti-retroviral drugs are used to treat the disease, most of the AIDS infected poverty-stricken populations of Africa cannot afford the drugs. Even when the drugs are available free of charge, traditional beliefs and superstitions still prevent some Africans from benefiting from these drugs.
African rulers have also been 'preoccupied' with coming up with solutions to the pandemic. Some have been realistic, while others have been controversial.
Even though, the former South African Vice President Jacob Zuma provoked a debate on 'leadership by example' when he claimed to have performed an act of 'ablution' after having unprotected sex with a 'prostitute' to minimize his chances of contracting the HIV virus, no controversy in recent times has surpassed that of the ruler of Gambia, Yaya Jammeh who claims to cure AIDS. He personally performs the 'curing rituals'. He insists he can cure AIDS only on 'Thursdays' and Asthma only only 'Saturdays'. He is commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces and surely commander-in-chief of Traditional Medical Practitioners. Who am I to assess his claims ?
Below is an article culled from The New Vision(www.newvision.co.ug) published in March 2007.
The African president who claims to cure AIDS
By Hilary Bainemigisha
What is happening in The Gambia deserves mentioning here because it can very much easily occur in any African country where the leader has absolute power and all other departments fear to cross his path.
In January, President Yaya Jammeh, 41, announced that he had been sent by God – this God who loves African State Houses – to rid his country of HIV/AIDS. Baffling public health workers struggling against faith healers, he declared that he was given mandate to cure HIV. He produced a herbal concoction which he says cures HIV/AIDS as long as the patient on treatment refrains from drinking alcohol, tea and coffee; eating kola nuts; and having sex.
The news was received with praises from all corners of the country including the ministry of health, the country’s national university and the country’s press. The visionary leader, they said, was truly their saviour.
According to the Voice of America, (VOA) when a UN envoy in Gambia, Fadzai Gwaradzimba warned against talk of a cure, she was given marching orders on February 9. Gambia’s Daily Observer newspaper said she was expelled “because of her irresponsible behaviour.”
One Gambian journalist in exile, Demba Jawo, was quoted by VOA as saying the level of intimidation against independent press cannot allow criticism. “President Jammeh has never been a medical practitioner,” he said. “He has absolutely no qualifications as far as medicine is concerned. But saying this back at home can cause you problems.”
WHO responded by asking the president for samples of his herbs to be taken out of Gambia for international testing. He refused. He told the Associated Press (AP) that he has mystical powers and bases his treatment on seven herbs mentioned in the Koran. Patients are now flocking Banjul, the capital city, where the president oversees the treatment every Thursday. He told the dignitaries including the Cuban and Taiwanese ambassadors to Gambia: “The mandate I have is that HIV/AIDS cases can be treated on Thursdays. That is the good news and the bad news is that I cannot treat more than 10 patients a day.”
A journalist for AP, who was invited to the treatment centre, narrated that President Jammeh, a former army colonel who took over power through a coup in 1994, arrived in his billowing white robe, surrounded by bodyguards. He pulled out a plastic container, closed his eyes in prayer and rubbed a green herbal paste onto the rib cage of the patient. He then ordered the patient to swallow a bitter yellow drink, followed by two bananas. After the treatment session, President Jammeh used a string of Islamic prayer beads and a leather-bound Quran to pray for the patients. Pointing the Quran at each of the patients, Jammeh prayed: “In the name of Allah, in three to 30 days you will all be cured.”
The patients were then herded into a minibus and driven to an empty hospital ward on the outskirts of the capital, with dormitory-style rooms.
“Whatever you do, there are bound to be skeptics, but I can tell you my method is foolproof,” President Jammeh told the reporter.
The biggest problem, according to WHO, is that Jammeh insists that his medications cannot be mixed with other drugs because “I don’t want any complications.” He has ordered patients on his treatment to stop taking ARVs.
WHO took a more cautious approach and asked him for blood samples from the people he had treated. They took nine samples to a laboratory in Senegal and four had undetectable viral loads, one had a moderate viral load and three had high viral loads. The technician who conducted the tests said the results are not conclusive because the individuals’ viral loads were not tested before Jammeh’s treatment. “So we don’t know whether they had HIV before and how much,” said Dr. Coumba Toure Kane, head of the molecular biology unit at Senegal’s Cheikh Anta Diop University.
But President Jammeh is spitting fire. “This treatment is not an argument. It is proof. It’s a declaration. I can cure AIDS and I will.”
WHO said that while it respects Jammeh’s views, “we would like to state quite clearly that so far there is no cure for AIDS.”
BBC quoted the country’s Department of State for Health and Social Welfare as saying that Jammeh would release the medicine’s formula when he deems it fit. “We cannot actually tell you the type of herbs we are using presently.” Health minister Tamsir Mbow said, “It will be known to the whole world later on.”
The HIV rate is relatively low in Gambia compared to other African nations — 1.3% of the country’s 1.6 million people are infected
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