Publication

This publication explores changes in public perceptions of HIV/AIDS. It highlights health-seeking behavior as a result of a successful antiretroviral treatment (ART) program in a community in which AIDS was previously untreatable. It focuses on Lusikisiki in the Eastern Cape, one of the poorest and most densely inhabited rural districts in South Africa. The author shows that the program is distinctive because treatment is administered from primary health care clinics instead of hospitals and by nurses instead of doctors. He shows that decentralization and distributing the burden of treatment provision among nurses and laypeople can address the HIV/AIDS epidemic and shortages of medical personnel.