ZIMBABWE

INTRODUCTION

Zimbabwe officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country located in southern Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers. It borders South Africa to the south, Botswana to the west, Zambia to the northwest, and Mozambique to the east. The capital and largest city is Harare.

The UK annexed Southern Rhodesia from the former British South Africa Company in 1923. A 1961 constitution was formulated that favored whites in power. In 1965 the government unilaterally declared its independence, but the UK did not recognize the act and demanded more complete voting rights for the black African majority in the country (then called Rhodesia). UN sanctions and a guerrilla uprising finally led to free elections in 1979 and independence (as Zimbabwe) in 1980.

Robert MUGABE, the nation's first prime minister, has been the country's only ruler (as president since 1987) and has dominated the country's political system since independence.

President Robert Mugabe serves as head of state and government, and as commander-in-chief of the armed forces.

Ethnic Diversity

An ethnically diverse country of roughly 13 million people, Zimbabwe has 16 official languages,[3] with English, Shona, and Ndebele the most commonly used.

African 99.4% (predominantly Shona; Ndebele is the second largest ethnic group), other 0.4%, unspecified 0.2% (2012 est.)

Languages

Shona (official; most widely spoken), Ndebele (official, second most widely spoken), English (official; traditionally used for official business), 13 minority languages (official; includes Chewa, Chibarwe, Kalanga, Koisan, Nambya, Ndau, Shangani, sign language, Sotho, Tonga, Tswana, Venda, and Xhosa)

Religion

An estimated 80% of the country's citizens identify themselves as Christians. Protestants (mostly followers of Pentecostal African Churches) are the 63% of the population. Roman Catholics are around 17% of the population. There were 110,000 (0.8%) who attended the annual Memorial event held by Jehovah's Witnesses in 2014.This number of attendees included Jehovah's Witnesses and others who are interested in the religious practices of the faith.

The followers of ethnic religions are around 11%. Around 1% are Muslims, mainly from Mozambique and Malawi, 0.1% are Hindus and 0.3% are Baha'is. Approximately 7% of citizens have no religious practice or are atheist.

Population

14,229,541 note: estimates for this country explicitly take into

account the effects of excess mortality due to AIDS; this can result in lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality, higher death rates, lower population growth rates, and changes in the distribution of population by age and sex than would otherwise be expected (July 2015 est.)

country comparison to the world: 72

Dependency Ratios

total dependency ratio: 80.4% youth dependency ratio: 75% elderly dependency ratio: 5.3% potential support ratio: 18.7%

TotalYouth

ElderlyPotential support ratio

DEPENDENCY RATIO

0.00%

10.00%

20.00%

30.00%

40.00%

50.00%

60.00%

70.00%

80.00%

90.00%

Population growth rate 2.21% country comparison to the world: 39 Birth rate: 32.26 births/1,000 population country comparison to the world: 34 Death rate: 10.13 deaths/1,000 population country comparison to the world: 41

Population growth rate country comparison to the world

Birth rate country comparison to the world

Death rate country comparison to the world

Infant mortality rate

total: 26.11 deaths/1,000 live births male: 28.4 deaths/1,000 live births female: 23.76 deaths/1,000 live births country comparison to the world: 69

Life expectancy at birth

total population: 57.05 years male: 56.54 years female: 57.57 years (2015 est.) country comparison to the world: 205

Total fertility rate

3.53 children born/woman

Contraceptive prevalence rate

58.5%

Physicians density

0.08 physicians/1,000 population

Hospital bed density

1.7 beds/1,000 population

Health policies and systems

The Ministry of Health and Child Care strategy is being guided by the 2009-2013

National Health Strategy whose life-span has been extended to 2015 to coincide

with the MDG year. The main focus remains working for quality and equity in

health whose aim is to improve the quality of life for Zimbabweans. The Right to

Health for every Zimbabwean was affirmed through the new constitution adopted

in 2013.

The weakened health systems resulting from decade long socio-political challenges

do require significant financial investment to reverse the considerable weaknesses

in human resources for health, health financing, health information, medicines and

equipment, leadership and governance and the overall service delivery.

Concerted efforts to make significant improvements remain constrained by national fiscal

space that remains small resulting in insignificant inflows into health budget.

Under the Government of National Unity set in early 2009, the Health Transition

Fund (HTF), a multi-donor pooled fund was set up to support the Ministry of

Health and Child Care. Since its launch in 2011, under the guidance of Zimbabwe

United Nations Assistance Development Framework (ZUNDAF) coupled with the

support from other donor funding i.e. Global Fund, USG and others, Zimbabwe’s

health system is now set on a recovery path to achieve planned progress towards

'achieving the highest possible level of health and quality of life for all

Medical Insurance

The healthcare system of Zimbabwe was once a model for Southern Africa. However, in 2008 there was a serious cholera epidemic in the country, spread by water contaminated with human faeces, which has killed more than 4,000 people across Zimbabwe.

The cholera outbreak plus an economic meltdown has pushed the country’s healthcare system to near collapse. Although the healthcare system in the Zimbabwe has faced difficulties in recent years, the Government had made effort in improving the healthcare system.

Hygiene and hygiene promotion

A network of volunteers was mobilised and trained to carry out health and hygiene

activities using a variety of methods (house-to-house visits, dramas, and focus group

discussions) to promote hand washing, safe water management, and cholera transmission

routes among other things.

The Volunteers were also mandated to disseminate IEC

materials that included flyers, stickers and posters. Most of the volunteers in the urban

areas were being paid allowances by International Non Governmental Organisations

(INGOs) and those in the rural areas were not being paid.

HIV/AIDS in Zimbabwe

The 2012 Zimbabwe Demographic And Health Survey (ZDHS) estimated national HIV prevalence rates at 15%, meaning that they estimated 12% infection rate for men, and 18% for women. However, these numbers are based on data from pregnant women at antenatal clinics, which are notoriously unreliable in estimating national HIV prevalence rates, because the subset of the population used, pregnant women, are not statistically representative of the general population.

No follow up testing is done if more than 10% of samples show a positive result after the initial test. As a result, false positives are not eliminated from the survey results.

Zimbabwe continues to suffer a severe socioeconomic and political crisis, including unprecedented rates of inflation and a severe ‘brain drain’ of Zimbabwe’s health care professionals. Elements of a previously well-maintained health care infrastructure are crumbling. Zimbabwe’s HIV crisis is exacerbated by chronic food insecurity. Sub-optimal nutrition increases the vulnerability of individuals with compromised immune systems to life-threatening opportunistic infections, such as tuberculosis.

However, the tide in the epidemic is now being reversed as more and more people are now accessing ARVs.

High risk groups, including migrant laborers, people in prostitution, girls involved in intergenerational sexual relationships, discordant couples, and members of the uniformed services warrant special attention in the fight against HIV/AIDS. Young adults and women are hardest hit by the epidemic. In 2005, approximately 930,000 women over the age of 14 were estimated to be living with HIV/AIDS in Zimbabwe

Gender inequality and widespread practices of multiple and concurrent sexual relationships, and cross-generational sex fuel Zimbabwe’s epidemic, particularly among youth. Social norms, including stigma associated with HIV/AIDS, excessive alcohol consumption, and a reluctance to talk about HIV status or sexual relations also create barriers to behavior change.

GROUP 431ELissa Laura Rayo