Deadline for Health: The Media’s Response to Covering HIV/AIDS, TB and Malaria in Africa
Executive Director’s Note

This report is about saving lives.

HIV/AIDS has claimed more than 20 million lives worldwide and some 37 million people are living with the virus. Each year, one million people die of malaria and the worldwide prevalence of TB, which is preventable and curable, has increased by 1.5 percent.

Africa bears much of the burden of these devastating statistics, with 25 million people living with HIV/AIDS, 90 percent of all deaths from malaria and an increase of TB rates four times that of the worldwide rate.

For those who are faced with the challenge of living with HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria in Africa, timely, accurate and responsible information is a key to managing, living with and conquering disease. While every sector of society has a critical role to play in creating a healthier population, the media have a central role to play, because of their role as watchdogs, conveyers of information and “diggers” of fact.

This report is the beginning of a project that was created by the International Women’s Media Foundation (IWMF) and the African Women’s Media Center (AWMC), a project of the IWMF, in 2002 with funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. At that time, the IWMF and the AWMC, building on experience training women journalists in Africa to enhance their skills covering HIV/AIDS, set out to enhance the quality and consistency of media coverage of HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria in Africa with responsible, accurate and relevant media messages. This effort became known as Maisha Yetu, “Our Lives” in Swahili.

During the project’s first phase, the IWMF and the AWMC identified five countries in which to conduct in-depth research on the media, with the goal of mapping, for the first time with focus groups, individual interviews and analysis of the news, the quality and quantity of coverage of HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria. The purpose of the research was to gather specific stakeholder views and perceptions, as well as quantitative information about the rate of coverage of these diseases, in order to inform the next stages of the Maisha Yetu project.

After this report is issued in Nairobi in September 2004, we will officially begin the second stage of the Maisha Yetu project. During this stage, the IWMF and the AWMC will undertake country specific technical assistance intended to improve the coverage of HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria. Centers of Excellence will be created in Botswana, Kenya and Senegal, with two centers in each country, for a total of six centers. For each center, the IWMF/AWMC will provide a local trainer who will work with the designated on-site liaison and others in each media house to enhance reporting on health issues. The Centers of Excellence will establish a foundation for “best practices” in reporting on health by developing concrete, measurable steps that can be adapted by other media houses, extending the project beyond the campaign’s life. We plan to share the results of the Centers of Excellence project with a broad audience of African media in late 2005.

A project of this magnitude requires the work of many people. I want to thank, first, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for providing the funding to make this project possible. Dr. Kwame Karikari, professor in the School of Communications Studies, University of Ghana, and executive director of the Media Foundation for West Africa, headed the research team. Julienne Louise Ngo Likeng (Cameroon), Lucy Oriang (Kenya), Anderson Fumulani (Malawi), Gabriel Ayité Baglo (Senegal) and Jean Nachega, M.D. (Botswana), led the research in the five countries. Sue Valentine, editor of Health-e News Service in Cape Town, South Africa, compiled research from all the country reports and wrote this final report, which incorporates months of work in the five countries. Thank you also to Lynn Povich, co-chair of the IWMF board of directors, and Akwe Amosu and Emily Nwankwo, also of the IWMF board of directors, who helped define the parameters of the project. Their contributions were crucial. Kathleen Currie and Gifti Nadi of the IWMF staff were also deeply involved in the production of this report. My sincere thanks to all of them.

Lisa Woll
Executive Director
International Women’s Media Foundation
August 2004
Washington, DC