Let us fight HIV in the right way.

By Isaac Ssekuuma, Communication and Information division

President Museveni publicly testing for HIV in support of the AIDS fight

A few days back I was with my nephew of five years and suddenly she said “if it’s not on the game is off!” I asked her what she meant by that and she said she had seen it on TV. Later on as I was relaxing an advert with exactly the same words was played with two ladies where one’s boyfriend denied her sex because their was no condom! It ended with both these ladies sharing condoms so that may be next time the game is on! Still on the same note as I drove through Kamwokya i saw a big billboard with the words “if cheated get tested want to cheat use a condom!” All these messages are geared towards having sex with condoms as a way to prevent HIV! True condoms may protect but they can’t prevent us from HIV.

 According to the Uganda AIDS commission over 400 new infections are recorded in the country on average daily with the biggest percentage between 18 and 26 years of age. Truth be told the biggest channel through which people get HIV is through sex and so we are just fueling the spread of the disease rather than controlling when we tell people its safe to have sex as long as it is protected. First condoms are not 100% safe as they have their draw backs: they at times break  due to friction in cases where a lady may not be well prepared, during the process of unpacking  at times they are torn especially if its done hurriedly, with the rate at which counterfeit goods hit the market with medicines inclusive some condoms must be counterfeit and risky to use, sustainability may not be possible especially for couples that have stayed together for long as confidence and trust grows, there is also general lack of knowledge on how to properly use these condoms especially when it comes to the female condoms and off course the cost of these condoms is a bit high for an average youth with this rate of unemployment. 

A condom costs between Shs.1000 and Shs.10000 so for an unemployed youth that may be so expensive for him to sustain if he chooses condoms for protection. My call for Ugandans is to use the only correct way of fighting HIV which is through abstinence until marriage and remain faithful to their partners after marriage. Most of the campaigns we use encourage sex through use of condoms but they never talk about the draw backs of using condoms and so in the process more people have gotten themselves infected despite the fact that they are using condoms!

 I appeal to the Uganda Health Marketing Group, Ministry of health and all the Civil Society Organizations in this campaign to focus on abstinence rather than use of condoms and off course tell the people that HIV AIDS is for real and cant be cured rather than assuring them that they can have sex with condoms and don’t get AIDS or that incase they get AIDS they can stay longer with ARVS. I think people can stay even much longer without HIV and without ARVs. LET US PRACTICE SELF CONTROL AND CHOSE ABSTINENCE IF WE WANT TO COMPLETELY WIN THE BATTLE AGAINST HIV AND AIDS