1 Million Africans to Die of AIDS, Report Predicts

At least one million Africans will die of AIDS within the next decade, and the number could climb considerably higher, a new report released Thursday predicted.

“Some countries are facing an immediate crisis, with a fifth or more of urban people already infected and likely to die of AIDS,” said the report, prepared by the Panos Institute, an international policy studies organization. “Elsewhere, there is so far little evidence of infection, and vigorous public education may prevent a major epidemic.”

Acknowledging that the data on AIDS in Africa is “fragmentary and incomplete” because of the reluctance of some African governments to disclose information, a Panos official said it is known that “the epidemic in the capital cities of Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Zambia, Zaire and maybe other countries is already three times worse than in New York,” one of the American cities hardest hit by the epidemic.

In some African capitals, one in five persons is now a carrier of the virus, Jon Tinker, president of the institute, told a seminar on AIDS in the Third World.

Dr. Jonathan Mann, director of the AIDS program for the World Health Organization, who also addressed the session, said he is “uncomfortable” with the institute’s 10-year projection for Africa, but he said he believes that 200,000 to 1.5 million Africans will become ill with AIDS during the next five years. “The challenge in Africa is enormous,” he said. “In Africa, this disease has the potential to become a catastrophe.”

The new report, AIDS and the Third World, concluded that “the virus already has spread virtually worldwide,” with the World Health Organization estimating that between 50 million and 100 million people will be infected by 1990, Tinker said. “Every sexually active person on the planet is potentially at risk,” he said.

Only 36,210 cases of AIDS worldwide have been reported to the World Health Organization thus far, a figure experts presume considerably understates the global scope of the disease. In the United States, AIDS has struck 28,246 individuals since 1981, of whom 15,853 have died. The U.S. Public Health Service has estimated that there will be a cumulative total of 270,000 cases by 1991.

Tinker said that Brazil, which has reported only 754 AIDS cases to the World Health Organization as of Nov. 27, “probably has nearly 2,000 AIDS cases already.” He said that a Brazilian Red Cross survey of 36,000 randomly selected people showed infection in 2.5 per 1,000 persons, “roughly double the level found among U.S. military volunteers” in Pentagon tests. There is still no regular screening of blood transfusions, he said, “and 15% of AIDS victims were infected in this way.”

According to Mann, “Brazil has the potential to have an African-style epidemic of AIDS.”

Mann added: “In South America, political attitudes towards AIDS have not evolved as they have in other parts of the world, including Africa. There is still a denial, a feeling that this is not a big problem.”

While AIDS has thus far “only lightly affected Asia,” Tinker said, “there are particular dangers if (it) should spread among Asia’s estimated 2 million intravenous drug abusers.”

Mann said the World Health Organization has estimated that 5 million to 10 million people are now infected worldwide, meaning that between 500,000 and 3 million full-blown cases of the disease will occur within the next five years. “That assumes that no new people are infected,” he added.

AIDS, or acquired immune deficiency syndrome, is caused by a virus that destroys the body’s immune system, leaving it powerless against certain cancers and otherwise rare infections. It can also invade the central nervous system, causing severe neurological disorders.