AFRO-NETS> Small thing: definition of seasons

[Maija Palander <maija.palander@tamgyn.inet.fi>]

Small thing: definition of seasons
----------------------------------

For all the time that I have been following the AFRO-NETS, there has 
been a small thing bothering me... this is the use of time-defini-
tions in the news. Now in the issue AFRO-NETS-digest V1 #276 there 
was this piece of news from South Africa:

"The government has been dispensing nevirapine to pregnant women only 
through two pilot projects initiated last spring, not on a national 
scale (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 8/21)"

Now in December and January we are in "summer" in Southern Africa. 
Does this "spring" in the sentence above mean September, October or 
November? Please, could you start to use the names of months instead 
of seasons in your news! Even the names of seasons seem to be inap-
propriate, since at least in Namibia there are in my opinion three 
seasons, the rainy season, the cold and dry season and the warm and 
dry season... and even these seasons differ around Africa. How do 
these fit into the North American and European spring, summer, fall 
and winter categories?

Maija Palander, MD (ob/gyn)
Project co-ordinator
P.O.Box 86664
Windhoek-Eros, Namibia
mailto:maija.palander@tamgyn.inet.fi

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