HIV/AIDS is having a devastating effect on economies in southern Africa, according to Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO).
In Tanzania, the government has told the VSO that as many as 20 a day were dying in its ministries and it estimates that if AIDS continues at its present rate, its economy will have shrunk by 25% in the next 15 years.
In Zambia, the VSO notes, more teachers are dying than the government can train, a situation which adds a geometric progression to the AIDS problem.
United Nations researchers, meantime, predict that the gross domestic product (GDP) in SA will be 17% lower by 2010, than it would have been without AIDS.
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