On her journeys around the globe, Mme. Secretary always makes sure
she meets with civil society which translates to business leaders,
opposition party members, students, and those providing various
services - in short, regular folks. Uganda was no exception. Today she stopped by the Reach Out
Mbuya Health Center, in Kampala, Uganda. They provide care for those
infected with AIDS and HIV. These pictures tell a powerful story of how
she was received there.
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| Secretary
of State Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks to Reach Out Mbuya, a health
clinic that has HIV/AIDS outreach, Friday, Aug. 3, 2012, in Kampala,
Uganda. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, Pool) |
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| Young dancers cheer for U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton as she visits "Reach Out Mbuya", a health clinic that does HIV/AIDS community outreach, in Kampala, Uganda August 3, 2012. |
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| Holding
her son Ignatius, 3, Sarah Nassolo, 29, kneels in thanks in front of
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (C) at "Reach Out Mbuya", a
health clinic that does HIV/AIDS community outreach, in Kampala, Uganda
August 3, 2012. Nassolo and her husband Charles Byamukama (L) with son
Isaac, 6, are both HIV positive. Their sons are both HIV negative thanks
to a clinic program which works to limit mother-to-child infection.
REUTERS/Jacquelyn Martin/Pool (UGANDA - Tags: POLITICS HEALTH) |
 |
| People
raise their hands in a prayer for Secretary of State Hillary Rodham
Clinton, right, at the end of her visit to Reach Out Mbuya, a health
clinic that does HIV/AIDS community outreach, in Kampala, Uganda,
Friday, Aug. 3, 2012. |
They prayed for her. How beautiful! It touched my heart. Thank you, Uganda , for loving our Secretary of State and for praying for her. Here are her remarks.
Remarks at Reach Out Mbuya Health Center
Remarks
Hillary Rodham Clinton
Secretary of State
Kampala, Uganda
August 3, 2012
SECRETARY CLINTON: Good evening.
AUDIENCE: Good evening.
SECRETARY CLINTON: And Minister, thank you very much for those
remarks. I am honored to be here. I am delighted to be back in Uganda
and to be part of this exciting effort, the partnership between our two
countries. I want to thank Dr. Ondoa for her hard work and for all that
she is doing.
And Dr. Talisuna, thank you so much for your work. (Applause.)
So we have two women doctors who are leading the way on health in
Uganda, and I am excited about being here, because I have heard for a
long time about the work that Reach Out does. (Applause.) And Reach Out
is well named, because what you have done is to be sure that people in
the area have a place to come to be given support, to be given
treatment, to be given dignity in order to achieve their own personal
goals of being healthy and productive citizens.
Today, more than 300,000 Ugandans are receiving treatment through
PEPFAR. PEPFAR is the program that the United States started under
President George W. Bush. And I will be looking forward to be meeting
with John Robert Engole who eight years ago was near death. He was the
first person in the world to receive life-saving medication through
PEPFAR. And now there are 300,000 Ugandans receiving medication through
PEPFAR. And I want to do more to make sure that every person has the
opportunity to become healthy.
And we have seen here at Reach Out and in other places across your
country how this can be done. In the 1990s, thanks to your government,
thanks to your officials, thanks to the citizens, we had the best
program in the world right here in Uganda. (Applause.) And we saw how
the prevalence of this disease could drop dramatically from nearly 20
percent to below 7 percent.
However, I am here because I am worried. In recent years, the focus
on prevention has faded, and new infections are on the rise again. I had
the opportunity to discuss this with the President and with the
Minister. Uganda is now the only country in Sub-Saharan Africa where the
rate of HIV is going up instead of going down. Now, I know that
Ugandans, when you put your mind to something, can really get it done.
So I’m hoping that together we can work on making prevention the focus
again and making sure that rate of infection goes down, down, down.
So we’re going to work with you. I’ve made that pledge to the
President and to the health minister. We’re going to review our strategy
with the Ministry, with civil society groups, and other partners,
because we want to emphasize what we think will work. And one area that I
particularly care about as a mother is to eliminate mother-to-child
transmissions of the virus. And we can do that, and our Government in
the United States recently committed an additional $25 million. I hope I
will come back in a few years, and there will be no babies in Uganda
being born with the HIV Virus. (Applause.)
We are very proud, Minister, to be partnering with you and with the
Ministry of Health. Experts from our Centers for Disease Control
recently arrived in Uganda, because we not only work with you on
HIV/AIDS; we’re also working with you now on the outbreak of the Ebola
Virus. We want to work with you on maternal and child health. There is
so much that we believe is possible here in Uganda.
Now, clinics like this, this wonderful program in this beautiful place
needs resources, and all of us must keep up our funding commitments –
the Government of Uganda, other donors like the United States, and I am
looking forward to being able to work with you to do that. This clinic
is a model not only for Uganda, but for all of Africa, indeed for the
world. And I can see it has a lot of citizen and community support. And
that’s what makes it work, and that’s what’s made Uganda unique in the
fight against HIV and AIDS.
I want Uganda, once again, to be the model for the world, and I know
Uganda can be. When I first came to Uganda in the mid-1990s when my
husband was President, I came because there wasn’t anywhere else I could
have gone in the world that was doing a better job. When I came back
with my husband on his trip as President – and I don’t know if you
remember, but when he was – as President in those years when he traveled
across Africa and he came to Uganda, he met a little boy who had just
been born, and they named him Bill Clinton. And so my husband was just
back in Uganda a week ago, and he met Bill Clinton, who’s now about 12
years old. And he’s healthy, and he’s handsome, and he’s doing well in
school. That’s what we want for every boy and girl in Uganda. We want a
good future.
So let me close by saying that the American people are deeply proud
to be your partners and your friends, and we’re going to keep working
together on the economy, on better opportunities for people, as
President Museveni said, on electricity, on infrastructure, on security,
education, and health. And we have so much confidence that Uganda will,
once again, be a model in HIV/AIDS, continue to develop, and make a
difference for the people of this great and beautiful country. Thank you
all, and God bless you. (Applause.)
