Namibia suffers from a considerable high percentage of HIV-casualties. Although official figures are around 20-25%, actual figures allegedly amount up to 40%.
Persons with HIV-diagnosis are also less immune against other diseases. HIV-patients are for instance more easily infected with TBC. If the patient dies from that disease before developing AIDS, it will go into the statistics as a TBC-casualty instead of an HIV-infection, even though a healthy person might very well have conquered a TBC-infection itself...
The Namibian government tries very hard to make the young population aware of the extent of the problem.
The schools regularly try to point out the consequences of the disease on every day life by playing school plays about it. The government also distributes a free school magazine with comics and testimonies from readers.
Most parents in Europe would probably be quite shocked if they would see what their 8 year old gets to read in the school magazine. It tries to disencourage young girls to have sex before their studies are finished, make them more assertive towards boys and if they do decide to have sex: the need to do it safe.
Every editions contains testimonies about girls who incurred pregnancy, diseases, violations or rape. In poor countries, sugar daddies are also problematic: older men give younger girls presents or money supposed to alleviate their poor living standards and to become friends with them. After a while they start to ask things in return...
Although HIV-infection, teenager pregnancies and child rape also occur in Europe, many Western people would probably be a bit shocked that the topics are put forward so openly in government funded publications. But with such high HIV-percentages, drastic problems call for drastic solutions...
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