Pretoria - As the globe marks World Aids Day, the World Health Organisation says expanding antiretroviral therapy to all people living with HIV is the key to ending the epidemic within a generation.
It said the “treat all” recommendation will enable countries to expand treatment rapidly and efficiently.
WHO will be presenting this recommendation at a major international Aids conference taking place in Harare, Zimbabwe, this week.
According to the UN health agency, trial results published earlier this year have confirmed that people living with HIV who begin antiretroviral therapy soon after acquiring the virus – before the virus has weakened their immune systems – are more likely to stay healthy and are less likely to transmit the virus to their partners.
Those findings led WHO in September to recommend that everyone living with HIV be offered treatment.
The other recommendations to be tabled include using innovative testing strategies to help more people learn they are HIV positive; moving testing and treatment services closer to where people live; starting treatment faster among people who are at advanced stages of HIV infection when they are diagnosed, and reducing the frequency of clinic visits recommended for people who are stable.
“WHO applauds governments, civil society and organisations that have made availability of life-saving antiretroviral therapy possible in the most trying circumstances.
“The new recommendation to expand [treatment] to all people living with HIV is a call to further step up the pace,” said WHO Assistant Director General for HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, Malaria and Neglected Tropical Diseases, Winnie Mpanju-Shumbusho.
UNAids estimates that 17.1 million of the 36.9 million people living with HIV worldwide do not know they have the virus.
Getting tested is a crucial first step for people living with HIV to access life-saving antiretroviral therapy.
According to the agency, “the world is poised to end the Aids epidemic by 2030 – provided it can accelerate the pace of progress achieved globally over the past 15 years”.
Since 2000, an estimated 7.8 million lives have been saved, fewer people are acquiring HIV, and projections of an end to the epidemic by 2030 – a goal once considered unattainable by many experts – are now realistic, according to the WHO report, Global Health Sector Response to HIV 2000-2015.
Over the last 15 years, the scale-up of antiretroviral therapy (ART) has been most dramatic in the WHO African region where now more than 11 million people are receiving HIV treatment, up from 11 000 at the turn of the century.
WHO said over the last five years in Africa, some 10 million men have undergone voluntary medical circumcision, a procedure that reduces their risk of acquiring HIV by 60 percent.
South Africa has the biggest HIV treatment programme in the world, with more than three million people on life-saving anti-retroviral treatment.
People are living longer and fewer people are dying of Aids and Tuberculosis (TB). Life expectancy has increased from 53 years in 2006 to just over 62 years in 2013. Mother-to-child transmission has also been reduced.
Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa said: “We have acted in various ways - big and small - to spread information, to fight stigma and to promote healthy lifestyles.
“We have made protection our priority, from classrooms to sports fields, from the factory floor to our homes, from our bedrooms to our boardrooms, and all corners of our society.”
However, the fight is not without its challenges, as the number of new HIV infections is still high, particularly among young women and girls.
South Africa will join the world in commemorating World Aids Day, under the theme: “Rise. Act. Protect”. – SAnews.gov.za
