UN AIDS Conference Spotlights Value Clash

In preparing for next week's UN special session on AIDS, Western countries are at odds with several Muslim nations over whether homosexuals, prostitutes, and drug users should be singled out for special attention. E. Michael Southwick, deputy secretary of state for international organizations and a leader of the U.S. delegation to the conference, said that most Western countries want to name these groups as needing special concern, while "Muslim traditional countries don't want to name these groups -- they see it as condoning or making their behavior accepted. One Muslim delegate said at a preliminary meeting these acts are against the law of God."

Meanwhile, AIDS activists planning to demonstrate on the streets of New York Saturday will hold up clocks to ridicule Andrew Natsios. The head of the U.S. Agency for International Development angered many activists with his remarks that Africans should not be put on complicated antiretroviral regimens because they "don't know what Western time is." Agency spokesperson Kim Walz insisted that Natsios "did not intend to offend anyone. . . . [He] just feels prevention is the way to save as many lives as possible." Yet even prevention is controversial: the Roman Catholic church remains opposed to the use of condoms to prevent AIDS.

The arguments over whether homosexuals and sex workers should be condemned or taught to protect themselves is bringing these groups under the widening net of the anti-AIDS struggle, said Dr. Nils Daulaire, head of the Global Health Council and former top health official at USAID. "Although it's uncomfortable for national leaders to talk about these issues and about sex, it helps people think things through. In the end, protecting these groups protects us all."

Back to other CDC news for June 19, 2001

Previous Updates