sex with multiple partners represents risky behavior in the HIV/AIDS era, basic beliefs and cultural taboos and practices exacerbate its spread. For example, men who are ill for long periods of time are often advised by traditional doctors to sleep with a virgin. Long illnesses like AIDS are often viewed as the result of a spell or curse from breaking a social taboo, like sleeping with a woman during menstruation, rather than the result of sexual behavior. Heavy social pressure on females to find a husband leads to unprotected sex with multiple partners as females are desperate to find a husband at any price. Males do not favor condoms and they belief that the number of female conquests equates to achievement. It is these and other attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors that make it difficult to resolve the HIV/AIDS crisis. As one expert on the situation notes, ignoring these issues aggravates the epidemic, “The linking of AIDS to poverty as the causal agent has caused some confusion and a reluctance to admit that behavior change is crucial” (Steps 1).
Mozambican Prime Minister Pascol Mocumbi is one of the few African leaders willing to address sexual behaviors and beliefs openly as a means of preventing and ameliorating the spread of HIV/AIDS. While many other leaders focus on the lack of resources and inadequate health care infrastructure, Mocumbi believes there is little chance for stopping the spread of the disease without addresses sexuality issues. Commenting on an upcoming United Nations session on AIDS, the Prime Minister argued, “There is likely to be too little said about what is the primary means by which AIDS is spread in Africa: risky heterosexual sex. HIV is transmitted namely through sexual violence and commercial sex. As a man, I know that men’s behavior must change and we must raise boys differently to have any hope of eradicating HIV” (Mozambican 1).
While the issues addressed above are critical ...