RESUMO
There is growing evidence that HIV/AIDS has enormous negative impact on health status and economic development of individuals; households; communities and nations in the African region [33]. Thus; there is urgent need for various disciplines to demonstrate how they can contribute in curbing the spread of this deadly disease in the African region. This paper; using an extended version of Professor Alan Williams [32] schema as the conceptual framework; attempts to demonstrate how health economics can be used to inform policy and managerial choices related to HIV/AIDS advocacy; prevention; treatment and management. It argues that the discipline of health economics (and economics generally) is extremely valuable in: measuring health impacts of the disease and interventions; evaluating the relationships between health care-seeking behaviour of individuals and health system specific attributes; the estimation of determinants of compliance of HIV/AIDS patients with treatment regimen; establishing of health institutions efficiency in combating AIDS; guiding choices of HIV/AIDS interventions; assessing the relationships between HIV/AIDS; development; poverty; and trade; programme planning; monitoring and evaluation; and assessing health system's overall performance. The paper is a modest attempt to show how the discipline of health economics can elucidate; and help in resolving practical and conceptual issues in HIV/AIDS control in Africa
