NEW YORK, May 5 (UPI) -- Health officials have drafted traditional African faith healers and herbalists in the war on AIDS in South Africa.
According to a report published Friday in the Wall Street Journal, Bush administration health officials leading anti-AIDS efforts in the disease-ravaged country are mulling whether non-medical healers might be effective go-betweens in getting people with AIDS to visit clinics and start on AIDS drug cocktails.
The report said that an estimated 80 percent of South Africans go to traditional faith healers when they get sick, due partly to deeply entrenched customs, but also due to the advantage of "low-cost, personalized" healthcare, the report said.
Thus, health officials have started integrating the healers into clinics and hospitals in the city of Durban as a test case to help persuade AIDS patients to seek conventional medical care.
As part of the project, the healers are being trained to test patients for the HIV virus, track their progress and refer them to AIDS clinics for anti-viral treatments, the WSJ report said.
