allAfrica.com: Ghana: Aids Treatment Plan Begins In January (Page 1 of 6)

Ghana's Aids Commission was set up three years ago, getting legal status in 2001. The Commission reports directly to President John Agyekum Kufuor and it has 46 members, including 15 ministers of state and representatives from civil society and the private sector.

Professor Sakyi Awuku Amoa, Director General of the Ghana Aids Commission has been working in the HIV/Aids field for over a decade. In 1989, he was the World Health Organisation administrator who set up the National Aids Control Programme in Harare, Zimbabwe. He returned to Ghana a year later and was appointed to assist in the Ghana National Aids Control Programme for several months before returning to his post at the Institute of Management and Public Administration where he became deputy director-general. More recently, when the Ghana government and UNAIDS were thinking of establishing the Aids Commission, he was the consultant who designed its structure. As he was about to retire, the government appointed him to head it. Ofeibea Quist-Arcton went to meet Professor Amoa at the Commission's secretariat in the capital, Accra. Excerpts:

Setting up an Aids Commission anywhere in Africa only in 2001 seems very late, considering the impact of Aids on Africa.

It took so long because when the pandemic came on, it was seen by the government and everywhere as a disease. So it was the Ministry of Health which was acting as the lead agency. The pandemic was then being managed as a disease under the Ministry of Health.

It was later on that it was realised that the complex and multi-faceted nature of the pandemic demanded a developmental approach - as well as even human rights’ issues to be considered. That required the need to look at a structure that would handle it from a multi-sectoral point of view.

This is what brought the National Aids Commission into being around 2000. It was a real historic development and a realisation that the Aids’ pandemic cannot be handled like an ordinary disease [nor] by bio-medical methods only; and there was a need for a very strong prevention and control strategy that had to be institutionalised [on] a multi-factoral basis. And this is what led to the Aids Commission coming much later than expected.

Let’s talk facts and figures. How many people in Ghana are living with HIV/Aids?

Currently, the national adult prevalence rate is 3.4 percent. This is almost a 50 percent increase in the last two years. In 2000, the recorded prevalence rate was 2.6 percent. In 2001, it was 2.9. And now we’re talking about 3.4. So, overall, we’ve seen a 50 percent increase in the prevalence rate.

The most vulnerable age group is between 15-49, as you find in other places. And in Ghana here, particularly you find that 63 percent of all the Aids’ cases are women. So the infection rate among women is very high. This is followed by the infection rate among young girls and the youth.

Again between the ages of 15 and 24, we also find that the prevalence rate has gone up by 50 percent. And that is something that should worry us, because it means that the most productive age group is being affected by this disease. And we have to do all that we can to make sure that we can either reduce the prevalence rate or just make sure we keep it where it is for the time being.

What are you doing to bring down the HIV prevalence rates?

This brings us to the way that we’re fighting it. We are focusing on five major intervention activities. The first one is the awareness creation. And we have almost achieved 90-99 percent awareness.

The second one is support and care for people living with HIV/Aids. That is very important. When infected individuals find that there is a system to support them, then they will be willing to come.

Our third major area is voluntary counselling and testing. That is a critical tool to bring about behaviour change. When somebody tests and he is found positive, the person will be counselled. He will then know how to live positively, so that he doesn’t go underground and infect other people.

If the person tests negatively, it will then enable him to protect himself. He will lead a positive lifestyle just to make sure that he doesn’t get the infection. So we are focusing a lot on voluntary counselling and testing now as a way to get behaviour change.

Our fourth area is treatment and care. Now this is handled by the Ministry of Health. Until recently, Ghana had not introduced the antiretroviral. We had focused majorly on prevention and control. But now, with the help of the Global Fund, we have got money to buy antiretrovrials that will cover about 2,000 patients. The preparatory work has been completed and the people living with HIV/Aids will be put on the anti-retrovirals starting from January next year and that is for two years. The drugs will be able to cater for 2,000 people for two years.

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