Georgetown : The steady commitment of the health sector and Non-Governmental Organisation (NGOs) in Guyana in the battle against the HIV/AIDS epidemic has seen the drastic reduction in the dreaded disease. This was revealed on Monday at the Regency Hotel during a discussion meeting on the 2013 Guyana Country Progress Report on HIV/AIDS.
Chief Medical Officer of the Ministry of Health, Dr. Shamdeo Persaud, observed that it was not an easy task to get the information together, but it had to be done regardless of the status.
He noted that while Guyana stills stands a little bit ahead of most neighbouring countries, with 1.2% prevalence in the general population, the Caribbean has actually achieved about 1% and Latin American countries 0.5%, there is still work to do.
Dr. Persaud emphasised that screening is vital for intervention and treatment, and that the education of families to understand this by National Aids Programme Secretariat (NAPS) is to be commended.
The opening of the stakeholders’ forum also saw remarks being delivered on the state of the HIV/AIDS fight by Civil Society Representative, Desiree Edghill; and UNAIDS Guyana Country Coordinator, Dr Roberto Brant Campos. The submission of Guyana’s report will be in keeping with the targets set in the 2011 Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS, and is to be presented to the United Nations General Assembly by September 2014.
This meeting was the final in a series of stakeholders’ meetings held to finalise Guyana’s document for submission to the Global UNAIDS Secretariat for the monitoring of targets set in the 2011 Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS. The submission contributes to the UN Secretary General’s report to the General Assembly, as well as the 2013 end of year report on the global AIDS epidemic.
NAPS Programme Director, Dr Shanti Singh said the only way to address the existing challenges is to strengthen education programmes throughout the society, even at the level of the workplace, among key target populations and even among health care workers. She also pointed to the fact of the consequences of stigma and discrimination which are many.
Dr. Singh explained that the whole concept of treatment and prevention is one that speaks to having persons who are HIV positive being able to access treatment to lower or suppress their viral-load to a point where HIV becomes almost non-transmissible. She added that the national fight against the disease is likely to be severely hampered since the continuance of stigma and discrimination is likely to see infected persons being unwilling to access treatment programmes.
“The meeting was one in a series of many stakeholder meetings which saw the crafting of “many, many drafts before we got to this first Draft that we are disseminating here today,” said Dr Singh.
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