Cities and Networks of Viral Epidemics; Responses to HIV-1 in Congo Basin
Moderator: Didier Gondola (Indiana University)
Scholastique Dianzinga (Marien Ngouabi University of Brazzaville)
“AIDS in Congo from 1983 to 2002: A Contribution to the History of Sickness”
This presentation on AIDS in Congo aims to show the need to take into account the broader history of the illness as a part of the social history of Congo. There is an agreement since the 1990s that AIDS should not only be considered as a biomedical problem but also a social one owing to its social, cultural and historic factors embedded in its transmission, treatment and prevention. AIDS was officially recognized in Congo in 1983 after the first diagnostic tests were available. Since then, a scientific committee for diagnosis and monitoring was established, which was replaced by the National Council to Fight AIDS in 2002. Despite these actions, AIDS has continued to spread. Some of the reasons are the political, economic and sociocultural dysfunction since independence. In addition to political instability which reached its peak with army conflicts in 1993, 1997 and 1998, more specific reasons are the high level of poverty and breakdown of moral values reflected in rising incidence of prostitution, use of drugs, and acts of rape. This paper addresses the following questions: What has been the role of public health policy in combatting sexually transmitted illnesses? How can historical data help understand the spread of AIDS and its management? What are the sources and appropriate research methodologies for describing the history of AIDS in Congo?
