Posted on 11/27/2001 10:03:30 AM PST by latrans
Please help stamp out baby rape by those who think they can prevent AIDS by doing so. Logic now tells us that since the government can't afford to medicate all the pregnant HIV positive mothers, some of those babies may be HIV positive. So, you may actually get AIDS rather than protect yourself from getting it. Please help spread the word to the people who would perform such an act, that the practice is now defunct.
Sorry if anyone is offended. I sure was when I read about the practice on this board. I was deeply disturbed by the story.
CNN is running a ticker with the story right now.
President Thabo Mbeki denies HIV causes AIDS
Associated Press
11/25/2001
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa - Busisiwe Maqungo's daughter died the same year she was born, infected with the HIV virus at birth.
Maqungo said the drug nevirapine, given to HIV-positive pregnant women during labor to prevent the transmission of the virus to their babies, could have saved her daughter Nomazizi, who spent her nine months of life in and out of hospitals before dying of AIDS.
The Pretoria High Court will review Maqungo's testimony Monday when AIDS activists and pediatricians sue the government in an attempt to force it to distribute nevirapine to all HIV-positive pregnant women.
In a country with one of the worst rates of HIV infection in the world, nearly 200 South African babies are born with the virus every day; studies show that nevirapine can reduce that number by nearly 50 percent.
The government has refused to distribute nevirapine nationwide despite an offer by the German-based pharmaceutical company Boehringer Ingelheim to distribute the drug for free.
"I'm very angry," said Maqungo, 29, who is now an AIDS activist. "It's very hard to look at an HIV positive child getting sick and dying. . . . These babies could have been saved by our own government."
AIDS activists and doctors have accused the government of not being aggressive enough in handling the epidemic. More than 4.7 million South Africans, 11 percent of the population, are HIV-positive. Ayanda Ntsaluba, director-general of South Africa's Health Department, said the government stands by its policy of first distributing nevirapine on a small scale to test its effects.
Ntsaluba said the government's approach is "more cautious" than what is demanded by the Treatment Action Center, the AIDS activist group that filed the lawsuit.
The government program has "a strong monitoring component, and one that takes a rigorous view of safety issues and effectiveness," Ntsaluba said.
Pholokgolo Ramothwala, a spokesman for the Treatment Action Center, dismissed the government's argument, saying nevirapine has already been found to be effective. Ramothwala blames the government foot-dragging on President Thabo Mbeki, who in the past has questioned the link between HIV and AIDS, saying poverty and malnutrition also contribute to the spread of the disease.
The lawsuit claims that by refusing to make nevirapine widely available to HIV-infected pregnant women, the government is denying women and children their constitutional right to health care.
This story makes me sick. These rapists don't deserve to live, much less inflict their sickness on some innocent baby. I have a 17 month old little girl. I feel pitty on the man who ever tried to even touch her. You haven't seen a raging female until you've seen me kick any man's a$$ for violating an innocent child like that. Let them all die out for all I care. God's rath for their sorry excuse of a human being.
The nine-month-old baby girl from Kimberley in the Northern Cape who survived a gang rape has undergone a full hysterectomy and will require further surgery to repair intestinal damage, a hospital spokesperson said on Friday. The Louisville baby was raped, allegedly by six Upington men last weekend after she was left unattended by her 16-year-old mother.
"Psychologically we do not know what the impact of her ordeal will be, but she is smiling at all the attention she is getting from all the hospital personnel. She had undergone a full hysterectomy and she suffered extensive damage to her colon and anus as well.
"There will be several more operations to repair her intestines," the spokeswoman said.
The six men, aged between 22 and 66, appeared in the Kimberley magistrate's court on charges of rape and indecent assault on Monday.
Kimberley police are still trying to confirm the rape of a three-year-old girl, allegedly by her grandfather, police Inspector Chantel Manuel said on Friday.
The girl was also admitted to the hospital earlier this week and was expected to undergo surgery on Monday.
In the eastern Free State two men from Tweeling appeared in court on Thursday after allegedly raping their 14-month-old niece on Tuesday. The girl also underwent surgery to repair internal damage and is recovering at home.
On Friday police in the Northern Province reported that a four-year-old girl from the former Venda had died of injuries she sustained four months ago when she was raped, allegedly by her 35-year-old father, at her home at Tshirolwe.
She died in the Mankweng Hospital near Pietersburg on Wednesday, Captain Ailwei Mushavhanamadi said.
The man is to appear in court on December 28 on a charge of rape and murder.
Meanwhile, the African National Congress Women's League and the ANC Women's Caucus on Friday called on the country's courts to implement a minimum sentence which provided life sentences for men who raped children and babies knowing they (the men) were HIV-positive.
ANC caucus chairperson Lulu Xingwana said the superstition that HIV/Aids could be cured by raping babies, children and virgins was an "ignorant, unfounded and perverse belief".
"It is horrifying to learn that adult family members including fathers are amongst those alleged to have committee these atrocities ...mostly the alleged rapes are committed by fathers, brothers, sons, grandfathers and uncles whom they look to for care and protection."
She said these atrocities were linked to the abuse of alcohol and drugs, beliefs that women were sub-human and to superstitions surrounding HIV/Aids.
Police earlier this week said that in the 18 months since January 2000 almost 32 000 reports of child rape and sexual attacks on children under the age of 18 occurred countrywide.
Amazes me how there is so much outcry over deposing the Taliban, but virtually no coverage of this crazy S. African rape culture. Horrific.
I see little hope for this country - even the social workers are quitting because of the depression caused by dealing with such evil. Civilization as we know it has much to do with sexual restraint. I wonder where they lost the idea ...
Unless this country wants to apply for statehood and join the United States of America, why should any of my tax dollars be spent on solving their problems.
If I wanted to help, I can send my own money to them directly.
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