Caribbean360: HIV/AIDS reduction in region

HIV/AIDS reduction in region
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Tom Hoyos on 04/04/2011 13:22:00
 
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, Monday April 4, 2011 – The Caribbean has made
important progress in the HIV/AIDS fight, with a 43 percent reduction in
AIDS-related mortality between 2001 and 2008, and an 18 percent reduction in new
HIV infections among children over the same period.
There’s also been significant expansion of programmes to prevent
mother-to-child HIV transmission of HIV, with four countries reaching 95 percent
coverage, statistics show.
But stigma and discrimination, homophobia and a punitive legal environment
continue to undermine efforts to reach universal access goals towards HIV
prevention, treatment, care and support across the Caribbean.
That was the subject of a recent UNAIDS-sponsored meeting in Trinidad where
representatives of government and civil society, people living with HIV, UN
agencies and development partners from across the Caribbean met to review
progress made towards achieving universal access to HIV prevention, treatment,
care and support targets. The meeting was convened in the lead up to the UN High
Level Meeting on AIDS, which will take place in June.
Political leaders were candid about the challenges and underscored the need to
engage young leaders and do things differently as the AIDS response enters a new
era.
“Fear, denial, ignorance, stigma and discrimination are still very prominent
in the region. It is a barrier to condom use, even accessing HIV treatment and
care,” said Rodger Samuel, Minister in the Office of the Prime Minister,
Trinidad and Tobago.
“The old approaches do not seem to be working, especially with the new
generation. If we do not get our youth involved, ‘getting to zero’ will be
an immensely hard task.”
There are an estimated 260 000 people living with HIV in the Caribbean. Close to
half of people in need of antiretroviral treatment are receiving it.
Overall, HIV now affects more women than men in the region. However, there is
considerable variation between countries. For example, 60 percent of people
living with HIV in the Bahamas are women. But in Cuba and Suriname, 69 percent
of people living with HIV are men.
“The HIV response shines a spotlight on inequality and violations of human
rights, and compels us to act,” said UNAIDS Deputy Executive Director,
Management and External Relations, Jan Beagle. “We must remove punitive laws
that are blocking access to critical HIV services. The law should work for the
HIV response, not against it.”
There are 11 countries in the region that criminalize sex between people of the
same sex, and 13 that criminalize sex work. Five countries, territories and
areas continue to impose restrictions on the entry, stay and residence of people
living with HIV.
Participants also discussed the need to increase investment in stigma and
discrimination reduction programmes to secure the rights of people living with
HIV. Ainsley Reid, Coordinator for the Greater Involvement of People Living with
HIV, Jamaica, underscored this by highlighting that “people living with HIV
need more than medicines.”
“I know people who have died with the medicines in their hands. What we really
need is social protection, including food, employment, housing, etc. This is
what it takes to move beyond ‘victim mode’ and have empowerment and
meaningful involvement,” he said.
During the last decade the Caribbean region received more than US$1.3 billion in
external funding for HIV. While some countries already fund their national
programmes entirely from domestic resources, others will be under increasing
pressure to reduce programme delivery costs and secure new resources as current
sources of funding decline.
Director of the UNAIDS Regional Support Team for the Caribbean Ernest Massiah
said it will be imperative to clearly identify the efficiencies in the region,
and “be ruthlessly honest about dropping what doesn’t yield us results”.
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