Nation in pain: Why the HIV/AIDS epidemic is out of control in Zimbabwe

There has been a dramatic increase in the number of people living with HIV and the number who have died of AIDS-related diseases in Zimbabwe since the early 1990s. This increase has caused shock waves and panic in Zimbabwe and in the entire southern African region. Understanding the factors that have given rise to and sustained patterns of sexual behavior that allow HIV to be transmitted easily and quickly among the general populace is of paramount importance if HIV/AIDS prevention campaigns are to be better formulated and to be effective in this part of sub-Saharan Africa. This article makes a contribution to those studies that seek to examine socioeconomic, cultural, political, and psychological factors determining high-risk sexual behaviors leading to heterosexual HIV infection in the African context. The author contends that the focus of HIV/AIDS prevention programs should be on a myriad of socioeconomic, cultural, political, and behavioral factors instead of just on women and prostitutes-groups that have the least negotiating power within the context of sex and reproduction in a patriarchal society such as Zimbabwe. The author also points out many important areas that have been omitted in the study of HIV transmission and AIDS in Africa.