KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — Uganda’s president is testing for HIV in public, saying he wants all Ugandans to know their status if the country is to stem the growing number of new infections.
Public leaders in Uganda rarely test for HIV in public, despite the urging of AIDS workers in this East African country.
Amid signs the HIV infection rate is increasing in a country that once was a global leader in efforts to fight AIDS, Ugandan officials want to test 15 million people by the end of 2014.
They acknowledge it will be hard to reach that target, the reason they believe the country needs the president to be a “role model.”
The HIV rate in Uganda stands at 7.3 percent, up from 6.4 percent in 2005, according to a 2011 survey.
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