LUSAKA, ZAMBIA — Who is leading the fight against AIDS in Zambia?

That was the question that brought about 100 people together at the Intercontinental Hotel here today. And the answer was -- not nearly enough of the people who should be. That was the question that brought about 100 people together at the Intercontinental Hotel here today. And the answer was -- not nearly enough of the people who should be.

Father Michael Kelly, an Irish-born Jesuit priest and now a Zambian and AIDS expert was there. He is tall and quite stooped in his 70s now, talking his way gently through a power-point presentation of devastating data. Three Zambians would die of because of HIV while each speaker was talking today he said.

And yet, he said, he had heard of leaders who said they would not win if they made the epidemic an election issue, and of an editor who had said that news of AIDS on the front page would not sell papers. "Why are we that way?" he wondered sadly.

The conference, sponsored by SAFAIDS — South Africa HIV and AIDS Information Dissemination Service— drew a parliament member, a professor, a priest, the head of the traditional healers' association, others working hard in field and a lot of journalists, who seemed there to catch most of the flack that the group on the whole seemed to feel was their due.

The media, people charged, won't come out to an event addressing the 28-year-old pandemic that afflicts at least 14 percent of the population, unless a minister or the president himself is there.

And when members of Parliament formed a coalition to draw attention to the pandemic, the news didn't make the news, the group's new chairman complained, "not even a 'meanwhile.'"

In turn, a journalist from Panos suggested, perhaps if parliament members took a more active stance — say, for example invite the press to a know-your-status event at the hotel they stay at (that has been the subject of lurid gossip, apparently) in which parliament members get tested for HIV.

Well, they didn't get tested at the hotel, the parliament member conceded, but when 17 parliamentarians were tested for the virus at a local shopping center recently, not a single reporter showed up, he said.

Uh-oh. A representative from Journalists Against AIDS issued a "collective apology."

For me, who has yet to settle into the newsroom of my host paper, it was interesting, informative, inspiring, and as well as a puzzling and unsettling.

For all the good intentions that brought these people together, the finger-pointing went around the room like a scene toward the end of a whodunnit. Or in this case a who-didn't-do-it.

And, apparently the desire on eveyone's part that everyone else was doing more, is longstanding.

That makes the challenge of making more happen this year seem daunting. But at least I know that there are a lot of people who care. And that is a comfort.