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June 12, 2005

Helping Africa if Anyone Cares

The end of last month I wrote about a meeting between Condoleezza Rice, "senior" White House officials and members of the black clergy on developing U.S policy in Africa. The focus of that meeting seemed to be AIDS orphans. In my post I said, "My problem is that attacking this worthy goal is, nonetheless, a smoke screen to divert attention from the larger problems in Africa." Now, this morning's Los Angeles Times has an opinion piece by Jeffrey D. Sachs a Columbia University economist that gives considerable substance to my comment. The column is entitled, "Africa's Suffering Is Bush's Shame."

He notes that Bush flat-out refused Tony Blair's request that the U.S. join in a multi-national effort to double aid to Africa. More importantly he debunk two myths that are often used to withhold such aid.

1) The U.S. is a generous provider of aid to Africa. - In fact, our annual aid for all of Africa is about $3 billion, equivalent to about two days of Pentagon spending.

2) Africa is corrupt and mismanaged and thus cannot absorb more aid:

The myth that more aid would be squandered is pernicious. Once in a while, the industrialized countries try to accomplish something real in Africa. Notable examples are smallpox eradication begun in the 1960s, control of river blindness in the 1970s, increased child immunization in the 1980s, Jimmy Carter's initiatives to fight Guinea worm, trachoma and leprosy in the 1990s and Rotary International's bold efforts to eliminate polio this decade.

These interventions throughout Africa were remarkably successful.

He argues forcible for additional aid and concludes,

If the administration were more than modestly interested in helping Africa, it could learn about the huge gains made possible by Blair's plan to provide about $50 billion a year to Africa by 2010 — with the U.S. kicking in $15 billion to $20 billion. With that money, Africa could control killer diseases, triple food production and cut hunger, and improve transportation and communications.

These steps, incidentally, would accelerate the continent's transition to lower fertility rates and slower population growth because they would contribute to a lower child mortality rate and economic gains, which would help persuade couples to have fewer children.

Blair's approach seems far more sound then sending missionaries to Africa but then, I'm not the President of the United States.

By the way, if you are really interested in what the major problems in Africa are the article also gives the following information based on United Nations and World Health Organization numbers:

Leading causes of death in Africa (in 2002)
  • HIV/AIDS: 2.1 million
  • Malaria: 1.1 million
  • Cardiovascular disease: 1 million
  • Diarrhea-related diseases: 707,000
  • Poor nutrition: 143,000
  • Syphilis 89,000
  • War: 85,000

Number of people living with HIV in Sub-Saharan Africa - 25.4 million (2004)

Number of United Nations peacekeepers in Africa - 51,094 (2005)

Worst life expectancy in Africa - 34 years, Sierra Leone (2002)

Worse rate of HIV infection in adults, ages 15 to 49 - 38.8%, Swaziland (2004)

Posted by Duane Smith at June 12, 2005 3:29 PM | Read more on Current Events |

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