Islamabad
Some 320 children and adolescents died every day from AIDS-related causes in 2018, says UNICEF’s annual statistical update on children, HIV and AIDS, released ahead of the World AIDS Day – Sunday (December). According to a UN press statement here Saturday, low access to antiretroviral treatment, in addition to limited prevention efforts, is a leading cause for these deaths, with only 54 per cent of children aged 0-14 living with HIV in 2018 – or 790,000 children – receiving lifesaving antiretroviral therapy.
‘The world is on the cusp of making great gains in the battle against HIV and AIDS, but we must not rest on the laurels of progress made,’ said UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore. ‘Neglecting testing and treatment initiatives for children and adolescents is a matter of life and death, and for them, we must choose life.’
In Pakistan, a joint United Nations team led the investigation into the HIV outbreak earlier this year in Larkana district of Sindh. Unsafe injection practices were identified as the main cause of the outbreak. Since then, around 37,000 people have been tested and 1,158 were found infected. Unfortunately, 80 per cent of the infected are children under 13 year of age.
‘Supporting the Sindh government’s response to the HIV outbreak, UNICEF has established two Paediatric HIV Centres in Larkana district for providing care and support to the infected children,’ says Aida Girma, UNICEF Representative in Pakistan. ‘Besides capacity building of the medical staff, UNICEF is also renovating the existing infrastructure and providing supplies and equipment.—DNA
