THE TREND OF HIV/AIDS RELATED MORTALITY AMONG PRIMARY AND SECONDARY SCHOOL TEACHERS IN ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA: USING A VERBAL AUTOPSY METHOD.

BACKGROUND: It is widely argued that school teachers in sub-Saharan Africa are being affected and will continue to be affected by the AIDS epidemic. Teachers are considered as a high-risk group with respect to HIV/AIDS, particularly in high prevalence countries, where the epidemic has devastating impact on the teaching profession

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to examine the trends of mortality among primary and secondary school teachers in Addis Ababa during this era of HIV/AIDS.

METHODS: Data on teachers who died from November 2005 to October 2012 retrospectively and a longitudinal data for the new deaths during the year followed prospectively (November 2012 to October 2013) were included in the trend analysis. The data were obtainedfrom family members or care givers of 146 deceased teachers. Each completed verbal autopsy questionnaire was reviewed by two physicians independently. When assigned causes for deaths of teachers by two physicians were not in agreement, then the cases were given to a third physician/Internist. Cases with inconsistent causes of deaths by three physicians were labeled as "undetermined". Extended Mantel-Haenszel Chi-square for linear trend was used to check the significance of the trend by using SPSS version 20 and Open EPI software.

RESULTS: The trend of total and HIV-related mortality among teachers declined from 45 (31%) to 22(15.2%) and 15 (10.3%) to 4 (2.7%) during the first two years /Nov. 2005-Oct. 2007/ and the last two years /Nov. 2011- Oct. 2013/ of the study period, respectively. Similarly, the proportionate mortality ratio between the total and HIV/AIDS related mortality declinedfrom 0.33 to. 0.18 during the corresponding period. The decline in the HIV/AIDS related mortality was statistically significant with Mantel Haenszel Chi-square = 7.04 (P < 0.01).

CONCLUSIONS: The findings of this study demonstrated a statistically significant decline in total and HIV/AIDS related mortality among teachers in Ethiopia in the last 8 years. However, we suggest nationwide study on the impact of HIV/AIDS in the education sector for more representative data and better interventions.