Lesotho

FORMERLY KNOWN AS Basutoland, the southern African nation of Lesotho won its independence from the United Kingdom in 1966. After 23 years of military rule, a democratic government was established in 1993. In 1998, however, at the request of the South African Development Community, a brief military mutiny was put down by the intervention of troops from South Africa and Botswana. Lesotho is currently experiencing a period of peaceful stability, but the government is faced with excessively high mortality rates, low life expectancy, low population and growth rates, and a poverty rate of 49 percent. Some 27 percent of the population are malnourished, and 18 percent of all children are underweight. Over half (56.1 percent) the population lives on less than $2 a day, and 36.4 percent live on less than $1 a day.

Access to safe drinking water in Lesotho is somewhat dependent on the weather. Some 38 percent of the population draw water from unprotected springs and wells that may contain infected water. Only 35 percent of Basotho who live in rural areas and 65 percent who live in urban areas have access to adequate sanitation. The Basotho people experience significant inequality, with the poorest 20 percent sharing only 1.5 percent of all income and the richest 20 percent claiming 66.5 percent. Lesotho ranks 65.2 on the Gini Index of Human Inequality. With 86 percent of the population involved [Page 632]in subsistence agriculture and a 45 percent unemployment rate, Lesotho is heavily dependent on remittances from South Africa, where some 35 percent of employed Basotho males work. Lesotho also depends on customs duties from the Southern Africa Customs Union. After completion of a hydropower facility in 1998, Lesotho began selling water to South Africa. The industrial sector has become more important in recent years with increases in the production of garments and farm-related products. Even though Lesotho is still considered a low-income nation, its debt status is now defined as moderate. All economic advances have been undercut, however, by the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

The Basotho population of 1,867,035 is somewhat older than many of its African neighbors. Life expectancy declined in Lesotho from 52 and 55 years for males and females respectively in 1980 to 36.86 and 36.49 years respectively in 2005. This decline is due in large part to the high prevalence of HIV/AIDS. Some 36.9 percent of the Basotho people are under the age of 14, and 5.5 percent are over 65. The average Basotho resident stands a 68.1 percent probability of not surviving until the age of 40.

Out of a population of 1,867,035, some 30 percent have been infected with HIV/AIDS, ranking Lesotho fourth in the world in the number of HIV/AIDS cases. By 2003 estimates, 320,000 Basotho live with the disease, and 29,000 others have died. Approximately 55 percent of those infected are female, and those between the ages of 15 and 29 make up 75 percent of all HIV/AIDS cases. In the spring of 2004 the government of Lesotho became the first in Africa and the second in the world (after Brazil) to promote universal testing for HIV/AIDS. Through the Know Your Status Campaign, the government encouraged villagers around Lesotho to submit to voluntary AIDS testing. Codes rather than names were used to ensure anonymity. Government officials, including the prime minister, were tested. The lack of safe drinking water and the prevalence of improper sanitation practices have left many Basotho vulnerable to other infectious diseases, such as those spread by infected water or soil. Some areas have also experienced outbreaks of typhus and plague.

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