SA has 58 000 teachers with HIV

FIFTY-EIGHT thousand teachers across the country are living with HIV – and there are eight new infections a day, according to new research.

There were 2 900 new infections in the sector in 2015, the year of the study by the Human Sciences Research Council, which equated to the eight new HIV infections every day, said lead investigator Professor Khangelani Zuma.

“They are the scariest figures and this should not be happening, because educators are supposed to be more knowledgeable and you would expect them to know about HIV prevention,” he said ahead of the release of the survey findings, at the South African Aids Conference at the Durban ICC.

The research, commissioned by the Department of Basic Education, is the second carried out to investigate the HIV-related profile of teachers and school leadership, and the number of people living with HIV turned out to be higher than the first survey in 2004.

“The overall HIV prevalence among educators was 15.3%, translating to about 58 000 educators living with HIV in 2015. This increase was partly due to the fact people were now on antiretroviral treatments and therefore living longer – a good thing,” Zuma said.