By Odimegwu Onwumere
There is apprehension in Nigeria over the number of people living with HIV/AIDS. Only in Taraba State, approximately 110,849 people are living with the virus. Yet, only 27, 000 are currently receiving treatment.
And at the national frequency of 3.5 million, only 700,000 are currently on treatment.
The National Coordinator, Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS in Nigeria (NEPWHAN), Mr. Edward Ogenyi, made this known to the media on June 29 2015, in Jalingo, at the origination of a five-day Demand Generation Activities for HIV and AIDS Service Uptake in Taraba.
Information from the United Nations (UN) designate Nigeria, as a principal in the number of children having HIV/AIDS, with her 60, 000 children contracting the disease as of 2012. The source shows that more than 34 million people are living with the viral disease globally, while Nigeria is the second highest in the world.
Intervention The UN in 2000, first set goals to combat HIV. And fewer than 700,000 people received fundamental medicines. The international body made sure that fewer than 800,000 of the 3.2 million children living with HIV worldwide had access to antiretroviral medicines in 2013.
The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS, UNAIDS reveals that global asset in HIV goes up from £3.1bn ($4.8bn) in 2000 to more than £13bn ($20bn) in 2014. The statement goes further that the global answer to HIV forestalls 30 million new HIV infections and almost eight million AIDS-correlated deaths since the millennium.
Within the confines of the time, latest HIV infections falls from 2.6 million per year to 1.8 million and AIDS-associated deaths go downstairs from 1.6 million to 1.2 million.
It is conspicuous UNAIDS sets to get HIV treatment to 15 million people by the end of 2015, which it says has already been met, while it targets 2030 to end the AIDS epidemic.
Prevalent of HIV/AIDs The UNAIDS checkmates the Nigerian Government and says that Nigeria is being half-hearted in committing in the neighbourhood of resource allotment to wrestle the disease, adding that sites all over the world providing services to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV increased from 675 in 2010 to 5,622 in 2013.
The irritation, the body says, is that there is lack of leadership at state level to address the issue in a realistic way. The UNAIDS discloses this through its country Director for Nigeria and the UNAIDS Focal Point for the ECOWAS, Dr. Bilali Camara, at a training workshop on May 25 2015, on the determined 90-90-90 treatment target.
Dr. Camara opines that foreign donors provide $600m (N118.2bn), which represents 50 per cent of the funds required for the treatment programme, while Nigeria provides 25 per cent of the funds required; the body adds that the fund is nauseatingly laughable to close the treatment gap in the country.
The UNAIDS target for 2030 to eradicate the scourge, Nigeria is unlikely to be following. Dr. Camara reiterates that Nigeria needs more domestic funding to successfully undertake HIV/AIDS epidemic in the country.
The Taraba government approves of N500 million to fight the blight in 2015, but hope of hounding the bane is dim with such a repulsive fund by the government. Tackling transmission The UNAIDS is in top gear in inspiring the world to accomplish its united hallucination of zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths.
It unifies the exertions of 11 UN organisations – UNHCR, UNICEF, WFP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNODC, UN Women, ILO, UNESCO, WHO and the World Bank, and works closely with global and national partners – to augment effects for the AIDS reaction. The UNAIDS in collaboration with the National Agency for the Control of AIDS (NACA), the former says that Nigeria requires $1.2bn (N236.4bn) for the treatment of HIV/AIDS in the country.
The UNAIDS and Airtel Nigeria nonetheless, on 19 February 2015, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), to purge Mother-to-Child spread of HIV in Nigeria, at the Corporate Headquarters of Airtel Nigeria, in Lagos.
In its humanitarian gestures, the UNAIDS stops at nothing to assist any partnership with the NACA, other government agencies and the Civil Society, to advance Nigeria’s struggle at purging mother-to-child spread of HIV.
Dr. Camara, says, “Eliminating mother to child transmission of HIV and keeping their mother alive do not only improve the wellbeing of children and their mothers.
They impact positively on the general maternal and child survival.” Save Nigerians Looking for a way to save Nigerians’ lives, the Federal Government (FG) under the presidency of Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, on 16 October 2012, commences an initiative with the tag, Saving One Million Lives by 2015.
The occasion is well attended by representatives of UN agencies, governors, ministries and many dignitaries. Then President Jonathan, says, “Saving One Million Lives will be the new yardstick for measuring health sector performance in Nigeria.”
Jonathan understands the porous nature of the health sector and is looking for ways to curb the menace of which the initiative is one. The FG keys in on the UN Secretary-General’s Every Women, Every Child campaign geared towards cultivating international thrust on child and maternal survival.
There is the UN Commission on Life-saving Commodities for Women and Children. There is also an Abuja conference on indispensable commodities; part of a promise the UN Commission renews, recommends and implements on Life-saving Commodities for Women and Children.
“The Commodities Commission recommendations and implementation plan – issued in New York – stated that with increased supply and demand, as well as correct use of 13 specific commodities, more than six million lives of women and children across the world could be saved by 2015,” reports the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN).
The UNAIDS walks round the clock in making sure that Nigeria is not left behind in the global target against HIV/AIDS. On 27 February, 2015, during the world commemoration of the Zero Discrimination Day, the UNAIDS shows its support for Nigerian government’s obligation to ending stigmatisation of/and unfairness against people living with HIV.
Dr. Camara, says, “I would like to thank the National Assembly for crafting the humanly sensitive bill and President Goodluck Jonathan for signing the anti-discrimination law. This law is a big boost to improving Nigeria’s AIDS response because it gives back human rights and dignity to people living with or affected by HIV and ensures that the country ends the AIDS epidemic by 2030.”
It is palpable that if not for the pressure by the UNAIDS on the country, the HIV/AIDS Anti-Discrimination Act 2014, would not have made it illegal to discriminate against people based on their HIV status. The UNAIDS goes around, supporting such law in order to achieve a more compassionate environment for people with the virus to go about their lives normally.
In June this year, the UNAIDS and the UNICEF, sensitise people of the “Reformulated HIV treatment” which they say, will save more children’s lives. In a joint statement issued by the bodies recently, quotes the UNAIDS Executive Director, Mr. Michel Sidibe, as saying that treatment innovations, such as the one that replaces unpleasant and bad-tasting medicines, are a real breakthrough.
Mr. Craig McClure, UNICEF’s Chief of HIV/AIDS section, says, “We expect the medication to greatly improve treatment access for more children and support UNICEF’s equity-focused programming aimed at reaching the most disadvantaged children throughout the world.”
Ban Ki-moon, Secretary General of the United Nations, says: “The world has delivered on halting and reversing the AIDS epidemic. Now we must commit to ending the AIDS epidemic as part of the Sustainable Development Goals.”
Odimegwu Onwumere is a Poet/Writer; he writes from Rivers State. Tel: +2348057778358 Email: apoet_25@yahoo.com