What we know about HIV and AIDS in the armed forces in Southern Africa

This paper is a summary of some of the key findings of an eighteen-month MilAIDS research project that focused on how militaries in the Southern African countries of Botswana, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe had coped with the impact of the HIV epidemic since it had been identified amongst the ranks in the 1980s. As a result, there is a single major source for citation, which is ‘The enemy within: Southern African militaries' quarter-century battle with HIV and AIDS’. The summary does, however, contain other information related to developments that have emerged since the completion of the larger study, bringing us up to date with the contemporary discourse in the field.

The purpose of highlighting some of the elements in the larger study is twofold: to distil its main findings for easier consumption and to draw our attention to salient factors that are considered worthy of replication. A second objective of this brief paper is of course to whet readers' appetite to read the more detailed work referred to above.