The Blind Beggar

Anthropologists, sociologists, government leaders and public-health officials have all looked at and written extensively about the AIDS epidemic in Africa, but to my knowledge no economist has done any work in this area, at least until now.

Since economics was my college major and something I enjoy, Emily Oster’s (an economist and Becker Fellow at the University of Chicago) article in Esquire titled “Three Things You Don’t Know About Aids In Africa” pricked my interest.

The three things you don’t know are:

• It’s the wrong disease to attack.
• It won’t disappear until poverty does.
• There is less of it than we thought, but it’s spreading as fast as ever.

Don’t misunderstand, Oster is not “poo pooing” the issue of AIDS or attempting to down play it. She is just looking at it from a different and interesting angle. Worth the read. I was particularly struck by her insights on the first two items.

Speaking of AIDS, the (Red)emption project officially closed on December 31st. Mike and Robert report that 567 people from 10 countries participated. What a great project and my personal thanks to both of them for taking this on. Mike tells me they’ll be doing something next year also. Read Mike’s report here and Robert’s here.

HT: Freakonomics Blog

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