Gold, drugs and AIDS
Madina Querre
Anthropologist, victimologist MRS Laboratory for Studies on Societies, Health and Development, Bordeaux, France
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Failure to enforce children's rights and labour laws create conditions conducive to drug abuse and cause the AIDS epidemic to spread. The gold mining environment is a case in point.

Drug consumption during the present AIDS crisis in Burkina Faso is not limited to specific social groups in urban areas, such as wild night-life circles or homeless children living in and on the streets. It is proposed to deal here with places which are far removed from urban circles, but greatly beset by both AIDS and drug addiction: the gold mines. Some of these mines are located in the north-east of the country, where the Essakan mine is one of the largest. No exact figures assessing these risks in epidemiological terms are available, since no studies have been carried out on this subject so far.

No work contracts, no health insurance, no welfare benefits.

According to national estimates, the HIV prevalence* rate were 7.17% in late 1997 (1). In the Dori area, the National AIDS control plan reported an HIV infection prevalence rate of 9.7% in 1994 specifically at the gold mining sites. Prevention projects have started to be implemented by organisations such as Save the Children. In addition to the extremely indigent living conditions, the question arises as to what factors may lead individuals to become exposed to drug addiction and AIDS risks, and what attracts people to the gold mining sites in the first place.

A study published by the International Labour' Organisation in 1996 showed that 1 out of 10 people in the Sahel were living in a gold mining area, and that women and children were the main targets of disease (dermatitis, conjunctivitis, silicosis, bronchopneumonia, tuberculosis, STD/AIDS, etc.).

The working of these freely accessible sites has expanded conspicuously since the 1984 drought. One of the main sites is that of Essakan, north-east of Dori, on the border with Niger, where over 10,000 gold panners live.

Gold panning means taking tunnels that follow the vein of gold. Men and young people go down into these long, dark galleries, which are very narrow and have a single opening, to depths of 15 or even 60 metres. The number of people officially allowed to occupy the pits is between 5 and 12, but there tend to be more than 20, hired without a work contract and therefore without any social or health insurance to cover the frequent accidents that take place. These "mole holes" obviously require great physical stamina, the working conditions are hard, involving close confinement and no preventive measures, and there is a permanent risk of a cave-in, since no supporting structures have been installed for safety. The men who go down into these "death traps" are supposed to be at least 20 years old, but there are also many adolescents between 13 and 15 years of age among them.

It was estimated in 1992 that the children working underground amounted to 8-10% of all the workers and that the boys and girls under the age of 15 working on the site amounted to 20-25% of the workers, all activities combined.

To cope with the difficult working conditions, most of the young people -nearly 80% of them according to Save the Children- use narcotics and amphetamines* that enable them to look for gold for several hours on end. Drug smuggling has been organised with neighbouring countries. A sixty-year old ranch worker living in the area was jailed in 1996 for amphetamine dealing.

Since these drugs are expensive (they cost 250 to 500F CFA a dose), and the average consumption is 5 to 7 tablets per day, children often resort to inhaling solvents because they are less expensive and easy to come by: they come in the form of tubes of puncture repair patch glue. This is the same product that is used by youths and children living in and on the streets (2). Smoked drugs are rarely used and if so, they are taken with something else, with no special logic about it, blending "two coloured", "blue-blue", "fourteen" and/or "hub-cap" amphetamine tablets with solvents or alcohol.

"My brother went down into the shaft and stayed down, doped up by the tablets he was always taking, and he couldn't even come back up. He must have had an accident and couldn't find the strength to come back up. He was always going back down and kept on taking the stuff even when he was back in the village," says one youth from Dori.

The prevalence of HIV/AIDS is thought to be as high as 47 to 60% at the gold mine.

In addition to the diseases such as tuberculosis and silicosis which often result from the poor living and working conditions, three out of every four prospectors are infected with STDs (especially syphilis and AIDS), according to the Essakan health services. HIV infection/AIDS are said to have a 47 to 60% prevalence rate on the site. These figures are only rough estimates, since no exact data are available.

No awareness campaigns have ever been launched about the risk of STD/AIDS, and prostitution is very common, although this is not the only channel whereby the disease is transmitted.

Due to their unstable environment characterised by poverty and the complete lack of State involvement, the local inhabitants, especially the young, frequently end up on these prospecting sites which look to them like El Dorado, a promise of fortune. They run many risks, including that of AIDS and drug addiction. In response to the prevalence rate that has by now eached alarming proportions, preventive measures can ;till be added to the labour laws that all companies are ;upposed to obey. Or this could be done by enforcing he Convention on children's rights, which was ratified by Burkina Faso. As well as in the determined strategies of development organisations, which are nevertheless veakened by the fact that they are only drawn up in emergency situations.

The problems raised by the risk of drug addiction and :ontamination with AIDS show that a host of multiple actors are contributing to the vulnerability of these populations. Work must be done on many lines, focusing on enforcing human rights. Although only the people exposed to the risk of becoming victims have :he means of acting to change the factors that put hem at risk, help in political form is a prerequisite for ;uccess. In Burkina Faso, little help of this kind has been visible so far at the gold mines. Up to now, only a single bilot project undertaken by Save the Children has peen implemented to improve the living and working conditions of the children on the gold prospecting ;rtes.

1 Source: UNAIDS/WHO Epidemiological Fact Sheet, June 1998.

2 Frédérique Boursin, "L'implication des 'grands frères' dans un programme do soins en faveur des enfants des rues au Burkina Faso" n Face à Face: Regards sur la santé.