Yesterday, December 1, the global community marked the annual World AIDS Day 2024. The theme for this year's event was "Take the Rights Path: My Health, My Right!" which Nigeria has adopted as "Take the Rights Path: Sustain HIV Response, Stop HIV Among Children to End AIDS in Nigeria by 2030."
The goal, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO), is to call on global leaders and citizens to champion the right to health by addressing inequalities that hinder progress in ending HIV and AIDS.
This means that everyone should have access to the health services they need, including HIV prevention, treatment, and care services when and where they need them. "Protecting the right to health means ensuring that healthcare is available to everyone, without any discrimination, regardless of their HIV status, background, gender, or where they live," the WHO said.
Available statistics show that about two million Nigerians are currently living with HIV/AIDS, with 1.6 million on antiretroviral treatment. According to WHO, this disease remains a major global public health issue, having claimed an estimated 42.3 million lives to date.
To mark this year's event, the National Agency for the Control of AIDS (NACA) announced the establishment of a National Acceleration Committee to monitor the implementation of the Global Alliance Action Plan, aimed at ending AIDS in children.
This laudable initiative, we believe, is essential, as it will build on the successes of past initiatives, especially in the area of education and public awareness, which has reduced the stigma against persons living with HIV/AIDS to an impressive degree.
We also recall that on February 1, 2022, then-President Muhammadu Buhari launched a N62 billion intervention fund for the prevention and treatment of HIV/AIDS in the country. The HIV Trust Fund of Nigeria (HTFN), a child of NACA and driven by the Nigeria Business Coalition Against AIDS (NiBUCAA), a private intervention, was conceived as a sustainable financing mechanism for mobilising and deploying domestic private sector resources to address the Prevention of Mother-to-Child Transmission (PMTCT) of HIV in Nigeria.
According to statistics from NACA, Nigeria has the highest number of new HIV infections among children globally. It says one out of every seven children born with HIV in the world is in Nigeria. In the absence of intervention, the rate of transmission of HIV from a mother living with the virus to her child during pregnancy, labour, delivery, or breastfeeding ranges from 15 per cent to 45 per cent. However, with the right treatment, this risk is reduced to less than one per cent.
Referring to the UNAIDS 2023 report, which shows that approximately 160,000 children aged 0-14 are living with HIV, with 22,000 new infections and 15,000 AIDS-related deaths occurring each year, the Director General of NACA, Dr Temitope Ilori, expressed deep concern that despite progress in the fight against HIV, PMTCT and paediatric HIV coverage remain low at 33 per cent, well below the 95 per cent target.
She said the target was to ensure that more cases are detected and brought into the treatment pool, so they can lose the ability to transmit the virus to others, thus achieving the 2030 global HIV target.
It is also worrisome that despite progress, NACA has raised concerns about the possibility of Nigeria meeting the 2030 global target of ending HIV/AIDS. The agency said this concern was based on its recent records, which show that more children are contracting the disease, indicating serious gaps in PMTCT services in hospitals.
Stakeholders also lamented that despite Nigeria's progress in recent years, many persons living with HIV/AIDS still struggle with access to food, making it difficult to take their medication as prescribed. As a result, many have raised concerns about the status of the trust fund in addressing this issue.
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Similarly, because of the impact the disease's management can have on the lives of even relatives of persons living with HIV/AIDS, we believe that interventions should extend to their dependents.
Daily Trust also believes that while the country has made significant progress in national orientation on HIV/AIDS, reducing stigma, more work remains. In this regard, we acknowledge the contributions of federal and state governments, as well as non-governmental organisations, and urge them to sustain the momentum to achieve zero new cases. To end AIDS by 2030, the importance of collaborative efforts cannot be overemphasised; meaning all sectors of society must contribute to the response.
