The Historiography of HIV and AIDS in Uganda

Abstract

Uganda has been in the world headlines since the mid-1980s, first as a nation severely hit by HIV and AIDS, and later, from the late 1990s onwards, as the first country in sub-Saharan Africa that has managed to reverse a generalised HIV epidemic. Countless newspaper articles, television and radio documentaries and broadcasts, papers, books, and films have been produced about AIDS in Uganda, making the epidemic one of the most thoroughly researched and documented in the world. Medical doctors, virologists, epidemiologists and social and behavioral scientists, both Ugandan and expatriate, have produced massive amounts of scientific information about it since the early 1980s, in addition to which there have been policy papers, evaluation reports, and action plans produced by various government ministries, international donor agencies, and national and international NGOs and relief organizations which document the epidemic from administrative, developmental, and humanitarian perspectives.Uganda's AIDS epidemic has been publicized worldwide through the news media and various international agencies. It is being constantly monitored not only by national authorities and international health experts, but by myriads of Ugandan and international organizations, media, academics, and concerned members of the public using modern means of communication. Some of these national and international bodies not only monitor, report and educate, but demand their say in how the epidemic should be managed. Uganda has become a testing ground for medical and behavioral interventions, as exemplified by AIDS vaccination trials, the social marketing of condoms, antiretroviral treatment, and, recently, by the male circumcision trial. Positive results have then been marketed to other countries in sub-Saharan Africa as successful AIDS prevention strategies.