Durban - Quoting Ray Phiri’s song “One condom, one round; no condom, no sex,” Minister in the Presidency Jeff Radebe told young people on Thursday to protect themselves and their partners from sexual diseases.
Speaking at the Hilton Hotel during a youth dialogue prior to the International Aids Conference in Durban later this month, Radebe said that his key message was that prevention was better than cure.
“If you are sexually active, make sure that you protect yourself and your partner,” he said.
Radebe said that a social profile of young people done by Statistics South Africa indicated that the number of youth (15 to 34 years) in the country grew from 18.5 million to 19.6 million between 2009 and 2014. Youth now constituted around 39 percent of South Africa’s total population, he said.
The same study highlighted a range of problems facing young people, including quality of education, inadequate access to skills and training opportunities, high unemployment rate, vulnerability to violence and crime, as well susceptibility to communicable diseases like HIV/AIDS and TB.
The report also found that 43.2 percent of young men die from external causes like violent crime or car accidents, while infectious diseases were most likely to cause the death of young women.
“All of us need to do more to reduce the number of youth dying from infectious and parasitic diseases such as tuberculosis (TB), influenza and pneumonia, as well as the number of youth dying from external causes of morbidity and mortality,” said Radebe.
He said the 21st Annual International AIDS Conference was an opportunity to “take stock of the progress the world is making in improving access to prevention, treatment and eliminating the stigma associated with HIV and AIDS”.
The conference will see about 20 000 attendants from 180 countries including scientists, researchers, academics, government and civil society leaders converge at the International Convention Centre from 18 to 22 July.
Radebe said South Africa would showcase its “major successes and new interventions” in the fight against HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis at the conference.
“South Africa has the largest ARV programme in the world, with 3.4 million people on treatment. In 2015/16 alone, a total of 12.2 million tests were conducted,” said Radebe.
He said that empirical evidence from the South African Medical Research Council (MRC) showed that mother-to-child transmission of HIV had decreased consistently from 8.5 percent in 2008 to 1.5 percent in 2015.
“As a result of these successful interventions, more lives of babies and young children are being saved daily. South Africa’s infant mortality rate has decreased significantly, from 56 per 1000 in 2009 to 39 per 1000 in 2014. The technical and scientific knowledge that will be exchanged during the conference will further buttress our efforts to overcome HIV and AIDS,” he said.
Radebe said it was up to the youth to take a bold lead in finding solutions to the problems they face, including the scourge of HIV/AIDS.
African News Agency