Half of Africa's population, mostly the poor and disadvantaged, do not have access to existing essential medicines and many more are denied new medicines for treating common diseases like malaria and HIV, says a report released on Monday.
"Only 50 000 of the 4,5-million people who need anti-retroviral therapy have access to treatment despite significant reductions in cost," states the annual report for 2002 of the regional director of the World Health Organisation.
Only 6% have access to voluntary counselling and only 1% to services for the prevention of mother-to-child transmission, it says.
"The HIV/Aids epidemic continues to spread relentlessly in the African region."
About 29-million HIV-positive people, 70% of the global total, are in Africa, and an estimated 3-million died of Aids last year.
http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=19907
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