Overall HIV infections down but worrying signs of increased adolescent infections
By Clive Bacchus From West Indies News Network
St. Kitts and Nevis (WINN): While St. Kitts and Nevis and other CARICOM states are upbeat about gains made in the fight to arrest the spread of HIV among the region’s population, new infections among teenagers are proving worrying. Dr. Allyson Leacock, the executive director of the Caribbean Broadcast Media Partnership (CBMP), in St. Kitts and Nevis for “LIVE UP” Day, a special World AIDS Day event organised by the CBMP, Population Services International/ Caribbean, the National AIDS Secretariat and Caribbean HIV and AIDS Alliance, warned that the HIV battle in the region is far from over.
“The reason that we have to continue this fight is that despite the wonderful hope that the results are showing, of the reduction generally of 42 percent, on the other side of the coin we are seeing that in the last decade, the prevalence of HIV, the new infections were adolescents, have jumped to one third in the last decade. That means that we have a lot of work to do, ” Leacock told participants at the “LIVE UP DAY” event held on Thursday at the Treasury Apron in the capital Basseterre.
The age ranges that are predominant for new infections are 15 to 29 year old, and those who are 50 years and over, Leacock told WINN 98.9. “Some of our adults, who should know better, are continuing to have sexual relations with younger people. Please don’t tell me ‘the young girls throw themselves at me’. I am not accepting that, because you are an adult and you know better, ” Leacock said while declaring that that adults in the region are failing younger people.
“We continue to pretend that this is something the young people are doing independently. Children live what they learn and learn what they live!” The Caribbean is ranked second to only Sub- Saharan Africa in HIV prevalence and regional challenges persist including sustaining access to anti-retroviral drugs, reforming punitive, discriminatory laws and changing attitudes to people living with HIV. HIV in the Caribbean is also influenced by poverty, stigma, sexual orientation and sex tourism.
UNAIDS reports that in the Caribbean ” new HIV infections dropped 42% between 2001 and 2011; 67% of people living with HIV who need treatment now have access to it; and AIDS-related deaths continue to decline with a 48% drop recorded between 2005 and 2011. The number new HIV infections among children has gone down by 32% from 2009 to 2011.” But the international agency warns that most of the funding for the fight against HIV comes from outside the region. “… currently two-thirds of the financing for HIV programmes in the Caribbean as a whole comes from international partners. With several donor agencies soon to reduce or withdraw support due to changes in eligibility criteria for upper- and middle-income countries, and with Caribbean economies feeling the crunch of the global economic slowdown, the gains of many national HIV programmes are at risk, “UNAIDS reported in June this year.
The UN has also issued statistics, in its latest report on HIV, on the global stage. “Globally, an estimated 35.3 million people were living with HIV in 2012. An increase from previous years as more people are receiving the life-saving antiretroviral therapy. There were 2.3 million new HIV infections globally, showing a 33% decline in the number of new infections from 3.4 million in 2001. At the same time the number of AIDS deaths is also declining with 1.6 million AIDS deaths in 2012, down from 2.3 million in 2005.”
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