The Gambian HIV/AIDS Debate

I have been following with keen interest the ongoing debate on the reports of the Gambian President, Yahya Jammeh administering herbal and traditional treatment to patients in The Gambia.

First, I pray that he is successful and second I want to follow and endorse the well-written piece entitled “herbal cure and the HIV/Aids debate.

“The author is a learned person and presented his case with clarity, coherence and objectivity. I heard a BBC interview with the SoS for Health from The Gambia and what I heard was that the CD4 counts of the patients have increased after treatment was administered, at no time.

During that interview I heard a proclamation that the virus was not seen anymore in the patients immune system. My raison d'etat for paraphrasing the Minister is to distinguish between HIV, the virus and the disease Aids.

Simply as we have studied in Bio-Chemistry, the CD4s count goes down. Now if ones blood count improves it means the blood cells that fight the disease have improved and the risk for a disease like pneumonia or any related disease is minimal. If this is what is happening in The Gambia then it is a breakthrough for African herbal medicine and African tradition. The scientific community that have jumped to condemn the exercise should work with the health people in The Gambia and see at first-hand if the CD4 counts in these patients did actually improve.

The SoS for Health has been quite bold to take the scientific community by inviting them to come to The Gambia and see the improvement that has been made.

Africa has always been rich of herbalist ad traditional healers and I stand as a beneficiary because I was born crippled until the age of 12. Science did not cure me rather I was used as a guinea pig. I was taken to the bush, where I was cured by African herbal medicine and the mystical powers of the elders. We in Africa believe in our culture, we believe in tradition and we believe in mystical powers and if this works for President Jammeh God bless him.

By Ikechuckwu Emeze, US