Aids in Africa

Last week in History class with Ethan and Rexford (we are using Abeka World History and Geography) I discovered something that had me totally flabbergasted. We were going over their homework, I asked the question reading from the teacher book," List some diseases which plague Africa today. Which is probably the most threatening?" I don't recall who answered the question they take turns but the answer to the second question was MALARIA! What! Are you sure?? Serious? I can't believe it, really! I thought Aids was the worst disease affecting the Africa continent. Why aren't rock stars and movie stars raising funds to fight Malaria in Africa? Each year over 1 million children die from malaria, even if the victims survive the disease to adulthood, it debilitates them for life. I looked up aids in Africa on the web, most of the sites state an approx. number of people who might have HIV and the way they get that number is bogus to begin with. They don't give the number of deaths, why not? 250,000 people died in 1999 from aids in Africa. I am not saying that is not terrible and awful but compared to how many children die of malaria each year, aids in Africa is not an epidemic. Why do people seem to be more worried about a sexually transmitted disease in Africa than the little children who die from malaria? Maybe I am out of touch and everyone knows this and there is a bigger movement to help out children in Africa with malaria. Here are a few websites with good information.
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