An estimated
34.2 million people around the world are infected with the virus that causes
AIDS, H.I.V. The scary part, what is disconcerting is that 23.5 million or 70%
of those suffering from AIDS live in my part of the world, sub-Saharan Africa.
There is no prospect that scientists will
find, any time soon, a vaccine that will prevent infection with the AIDS virus
or a cure for our brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, uncles and aunts,
husbands and wives, friends and neighbors already infected with the virus.
But today our
spirits must continue to soar. Our collective will must be indomitable. Our
embrace of the gift of life has never been stronger. The vision of attaining
zero new HIV infections and zero AID-related deaths remains the collective
resolve of all of us.
It is possible
that in the not too distant future, no African child would be born with the
AIDS virus. I have a dream that one day millions of African teenagers and young
adults, heterosexual and homosexual, would have a very low risk of becoming
infected and those who do would have access to affordable treatment. Achieving an AIDS-free Africa is truly
imminent. We can and we must get there.
Here is why we
will get there. Historic success in scaling up HIV programmes, combined with
the emergence of powerful new tools to prevent new infections and AIDS-related
morbidity and mortality has enabled the foundation to be laid for zero new HIV
infections. We are beginning to reap the
benefits many years of concerted work and multiple strategies: behavior change
campaigns; promotion and use of condoms; medical male circumcision; access to
antiretroviral therapy; and, focused programs targeting sex works, gay or
straight.
According to the
just released UNAIDS report on the global AIDS epidemic, new infection rates
have fallen by 50% or more in 25 countries – 13 of them in in sub-Saharan
Africa. Moreover, the number of people dying from AIDS-related causes in
sub-Saharan Africa declined by 32% from 2005 to 2011. What is most heartening
is that half of all the reductions in HIV infections in the past two years have
been among children. The scaling up of antiretroviral therapy has saved 14
million life-years in low-middle-income countries, including 9 million in
sub-Saharan Africa since 1995. The pace of progress has accelerated. In just two
years, 60% more people have accessed lifesaving HIV therapy, with a
corresponding drop in mortality.
In what has been billed as a scientific breakthrough, scientists
have shown that antiretroviral therapy reduced the risk of heterosexual
transmission by 96%. Today treatment as prevention (TASP) is a term used to
describe prevention methods using antiretroviral treatment. An HIV-positive
person’s viral load is the single biggest risk factor in HIV transmission.
Antiretroviral therapy decreases the amount of virus in a person’s bodily
fluids, significantly reducing the risk of transmission.
Circumcision substantially decreases a man’s risk of becoming
infected with the AIDS virus by a female partner, cutting infection rates by 40
to 60 percent. In Kenya medical male circumcision in Kenya is focused on Nyanza
Province. 54% of the targeted 230 000 male circumcisions have been performed as
of December 2011. As a medical procedure circumcision is simple. A nurse can
perform it safely and it can be done in assembly-line fashion using devices
that do not require scalpels and stitches.
Although
progress is heartening, the war against AIDS is yet to won. The sharp reduction
of AIDS in Uganda was hailed as a stellar success reduction, providing a new
impetus and inspiring novel public health strategies to fight disease in the
developing world. Today, Uganda is one of only two African countries, along
with Chad, where AIDS rates are on the rise. Infection rates in Uganda have
increased to 7.3 percent today from 6.4 percent in 2005. Furthermore, Uganda is
one of in six sub-Saharan African countries where less than 5% of the target
number of men had been circumcised by 2011.
According to the
UNAIDS report on the global AIDS epidemic, HIV affect more women and girls
across sub-Saharan Africa. It is estimated that women represent about 58% of
people living with HIV. More
significantly, because of social and economic power imbalances between men and
women, a majority of girls and women and girls have little capacity to
negotiate sex, insist on condom use or otherwise take steps to protect
themselves from HIV.
The UNAIDS
report on the global AIDS epidemic provides specific recommendations critical
to the goal of zero new infections: provide HIV testing, counseling; ensure
timely HIV care, treatment and support for women an children living with HIV;
strengthen safe sex behavior to ensure that reproductive-age women and their
partners avoid HIV infection.
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