a traditional chief, though this person usually holds little actual authority. Cameroonian politicians have traditionally ignored the East. The region is simply too underpopulated to have much influence in countrywide elections. Eastern residents have in recent years called for more infrastructure improvements from the government, especially the paving of roads. Candidates for office and government officials do occasionally make stops in the region to address such issues, but their message is often simply an excuse for why such improvements would be detrimental to the region. For example, they often argue that paved roads would only allow the forests upon which the region depends to be cut down at an even faster rate. Education School attendance rates are difficult to determine for the East, but are generally higher in the towns than in the villages. Primary schools are fairly widely distributed, but most of the region's secondary schools are located in larger villages or in towns, meaning that students from more remote areas must walk long distances, stay with relatives, or rent rooms during the school year. In addition, school fees keep many families from sending their children for an education. Health Due to its thick forests and equatorial climate, the East is home to a host of tropical diseases. Chief among these is malaria, which remains a major cause of death in the region. Dengue fever, filariasis, typhoid fever, and tuberculosis are also endemic. In 1997 and 1998, health professionals recorded outbreaks of what may have been the Ebola virus in the southwest near Ngoila. The World Health Organization today doubts that this "bloody diarrhea" was in fact that virus, however. As with most of sub-Saharan Africa, poor sanitation is a major source of illness for people in the East. Diseases spread this way include schistosomiasis, brucellosis, hepatitis A, amoebic dysentery, bacterial dysentery, and giardia. In recent years, the East has come into focus for its role in the AIDS epidemic. This largely stems from the region's position as a transportation network for logging vehicles. In addition to the transportation network, the construction of the Chad/Cameroon pipeline has fueled the increase of Prostitution along these routes, with professional sex workers operating in virtually every town and village along the province's roads. Government estimates report the HIV rate among operators of these logging vehicles to be about 18% and that of the sex workers to be as high as 30%. Government