Question: How did the claims on the areas in the continent with an AIDS pandemic benefit the European powers?

full_context: Document 1: Modern history: The major European powers laid claim to the areas of Africa where they could exhibit a sphere of influence over the area. These claims did not have to have any substantial land holdings or treaties to be legitimate. The European power that demonstrated its control over a territory accepted the mandate to rule that region as a national colony. The European nation that held the claim developed and benefited from their colony’s commercial interests without having to fear rival European competition. With the colonial claim came the underlying assumption that the European power that exerted control would use its mandate to offer protection and provide welfare for its colonial peoples, however, this principle remained more theory than practice. There were many documented instances of material and moral conditions deteriorating for native Africans in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries under European colonial rule, to the point where the colonial experience for them has been described as "hell on earth."
Document 2: Scramble for Africa: The ``Scramble for Africa ''was the occupation, division, and colonisation of African territory by European powers during the period of New Imperialism, between 1881 and 1914. It is also called the Partition of Africa and by some the Conquest of Africa. In 1870, only 10 percent of Africa was under European control; by 1914 it had increased to almost 90 percent of the continent, with only Ethiopia (Abyssinia), the Dervish state (a portion of present - day Somalia) and Liberia still being independent.
Document 3: Eswatini: In 2004, the Swaziland government acknowledged for the first time that it suffered an AIDS crisis, with 38.8% of tested pregnant women infected with HIV (see AIDS in Africa). The then Prime Minister Themba Dlamini declared a humanitarian crisis due to the combined effect of drought, land degradation, increased poverty, and HIV/AIDS. According to the 2011 UNAIDS Report, Swaziland is close to achieving universal access to HIV/AIDS treatment, defined as 80% coverage or greater. Estimates of treatment coverage range from 70% to 80% of those infected. Life expectancy had fallen from 61 years in 2000 to 32 years in 2009. Tuberculosis is also a significant problem, with an 18% mortality rate. Many patients have a multi-drug resistant strain, and 83% are co-infected with HIV.
Document 4: List of countries by HIV/AIDS adult prevalence rate: The HIV pandemic is most severe in Sub-Saharan Africa. Over 60% of all people living with HIV reside within the region. Adult HIV prevalence exceed 20% in Swaziland, Botswana, and Lesotho, while an additional six countries report adult HIV prevalence of at least 10%. In terms of raw HIV case numbers, South Africa, followed by Nigeria (3.2 million), and Philippines (2.1 million) by the end of 2013. While South Africa's large population of HIV - positive people is attributable to its high disease prevalence (17.3%, ranked highest in the world) and Nigeria is ranked 20th (3.7%), India's prevalence (0.3%) is comparable to Canada, the UK, and lower than the USA due to its large population (192 million).
Document 5: Pandemic: HIV originated in Africa, and spread to the United States via Haiti between 1966 and 1972. AIDS is currently a pandemic, with infection rates as high as 25% in southern and eastern Africa. In 2006, the HIV prevalence rate among pregnant women in South Africa was 29.1%. Effective education about safer sexual practices and bloodborne infection precautions training have helped to slow down infection rates in several African countries sponsoring national education programs. Infection rates are rising again in Asia and the Americas. The AIDS death toll in Africa may reach 90–100 million by 2025.
Document 6: HIV/AIDS: In 2016, about 36.7 million people were living with HIV and it resulted in 1 million deaths. There were 300,000 fewer new HIV cases in 2016 than in 2015. Most of those infected live in sub-Saharan Africa. From the time AIDS was identified in the early 1980s to 2017, the disease has caused an estimated 35 million deaths worldwide. HIV / AIDS is considered a pandemic -- a disease outbreak which is present over a large area and is actively spreading. HIV originated in west - central Africa during the late 19th or early 20th century. AIDS was first recognized by the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in 1981 and its cause -- HIV infection -- was identified in the early part of the decade.
Document 7: Virus: Native American populations were devastated by contagious diseases, in particular, smallpox, brought to the Americas by European colonists. It is unclear how many Native Americans were killed by foreign diseases after the arrival of Columbus in the Americas, but the numbers have been estimated to be close to 70% of the indigenous population. The damage done by this disease significantly aided European attempts to displace and conquer the native population.A pandemic is a worldwide epidemic. The 1918 flu pandemic, which lasted until 1919, was a category 5 influenza pandemic caused by an unusually severe and deadly influenza A virus. The victims were often healthy young adults, in contrast to most influenza outbreaks, which predominantly affect juvenile, elderly, or otherwise-weakened patients. Older estimates say it killed 40–50 million people, while more recent research suggests that it may have killed as many as 100 million people, or 5% of the world's population in 1918.Most researchers believe that HIV originated in sub-Saharan Africa during the 20th century; it is now a pandemic, with an estimated 38.6 million people now living with the disease worldwide. The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) and the World Health Organization (WHO) estimate that AIDS has killed more than 25 million people since it was first recognised on 5 June 1981, making it one of the most destructive epidemics in recorded history. In 2007 there were 2.7 million new HIV infections and 2 million HIV-related deaths.
Document 8: History of colonialism: Africa was the target of the third wave of European colonialism, after that of the Americas and Asia. Many European statesmen and industrialists wanted to accelerate the Scramble for Africa, securing colonies before they strictly needed them. As a champion of Realpolitik, Bismarck disliked colonies and thought they were a waste of time, but his hand was forced by pressure from both the elites and the general population which considered the colonization a necessity for German prestige. German colonies in Togoland, Samoa, South - West Africa and New Guinea had corporate commercial roots, while the equivalent German - dominated areas in East Africa and China owed more to political motives. The British also took an interest in Africa, using the East Africa Company to take over what are now Kenya and Uganda. The British crown formally took over in 1895 and renamed the area the East Africa Protectorate.
Document 9: Modern history: At the time of the Berlin Conference, Africa contained one-fifth of the world’s population living in one-quarter of the world’s land area. However, from Europe's perspective, they were dividing an unknown continent. European countries established a few coastal colonies in Africa by the mid-nineteenth century, which included Cape Colony (Great Britain), Angola (Portugal), and Algeria (France), but until the late nineteenth century Europe largely traded with free African states without feeling the need for territorial possession. Until the 1880s most of Africa remained unchartered, with western maps from the period generally showing blank spaces for the continent’s interior.
Document 10: Namibia: The malaria problem seems to be compounded by the AIDS epidemic. Research has shown that in Namibia the risk of contracting malaria is 14.5% greater if a person is also infected with HIV. The risk of death from malaria is also raised by approximately 50% with a concurrent HIV infection. Given infection rates this large, as well as a looming malaria problem, it may be very difficult for the government to deal with both the medical and economic impacts of this epidemic. The country had only 598 physicians in 2002.
Document 11: Modern history: From the 1880s to 1914, the European powers expanded their control across the African continent, competing with each other for Africa’s land and resources. Great Britain controlled various colonial holdings in East Africa that spanned the length of the African continent from Egypt in the north to South Africa. The French gained major ground in West Africa, and the Portuguese held colonies in southern Africa. Germany, Italy, and Spain established a small number of colonies at various points throughout the continent, which included German East Africa (Tanganyika) and German Southwest Africa for Germany, Eritrea and Libya for Italy, and the Canary Islands and Rio de Oro in northwestern Africa for Spain. Finally, for King Leopold (ruled from 1865–1909), there was the large “piece of that great African cake” known as the Congo, which, unfortunately for the native Congolese, became his personal fiefdom to do with as he pleased in Central Africa. By 1914, almost the entire continent was under European control. Liberia, which was settled by freed American slaves in the 1820s, and Abyssinia (Ethiopia) in eastern Africa were the last remaining independent African states. (John Merriman, A History of Modern Europe, Volume Two: From the French Revolution to the Present, Third Edition (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2010), pp. 819–859).
Document 12: Scramble for Africa: The Berlin Conference of 1884, which regulated European colonisation and trade in Africa, is usually referred to as the starting point of the scramble for Africa. Consequent to the political and economic rivalries among the European empires in the last quarter of the 19th century, the partitioning, or splitting up of Africa was how the Europeans avoided warring amongst themselves over Africa. The later years of the 19th century saw the transition from ``informal imperialism ''(hegemony), by military influence and economic dominance, to direct rule, bringing about colonial imperialism.
Document 13: Imperialism: The concept environmental determinism served as a moral justification for domination of certain territories and peoples. It was believed that a certain person's behaviours were determined by the environment in which they lived and thus validated their domination. For example, people living in tropical environments were seen as "less civilized" therefore justifying colonial control as a civilizing mission. Across the three waves of European colonialism (first in the Americas, second in Asia and lastly in Africa), environmental determinism was used to categorically place indigenous people in a racial hierarchy. This takes two forms, orientalism and tropicality.
Document 14: Africa: In the late 19th century, the European imperial powers engaged in a major territorial scramble and occupied most of the continent, creating many colonial territories, and leaving only two fully independent states: Ethiopia (known to Europeans as ``Abyssinia ''), and Liberia. Egypt and Sudan were never formally incorporated into any European colonial empire; however, after the British occupation of 1882, Egypt was effectively under British administration until 1922.
Document 15: Namibia: Life expectancy at birth is estimated to be 52.2 years in 2012 – among the lowest in the world. The AIDS epidemic is a large problem in Namibia. Though its rate of infection is substantially lower than that of its eastern neighbour, Botswana, approximately 13.1% of the adult population is[update] infected with HIV. In 2001, there were an estimated 210,000 people living with HIV/AIDS, and the estimated death toll in 2003 was 16,000. According to the 2011 UNAIDS Report, the epidemic in Namibia "appears to be leveling off." As the HIV/AIDS epidemic has reduced the working-aged population, the number of orphans has increased. It falls to the government to provide education, food, shelter and clothing for these orphans.
ground_truth: colony’s commercial interests without having to fear rival European competition.
sub_queries: What continent has an AIDS pandemic? Answer: Africa
How did the claims on the areas in Africa benefit the European powers? Answer: colony’s commercial interests without having to fear rival European competition.