ISLAMABAD: While the number of new HIV infections has declined globally over the past decade, Pakistan remains one of the few regional countries to witness an increasing number of cases, as the HIV epidemic continues to grow among key populations with an estimated 133,529 people living with the disease in the country.
This was found in a new national survey, conducted using a grant from the Global Fund and took 10 months to complete. It was carried out in 20 cities, in which 60 teams collected data from around 5,000 places.
The Global Fund is a partnership organisation founded in 2002 to accelerate the end of AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria as epidemics. It is a partnership between governments, civil society, the private sector and those affected by the diseases, and raises and invests nearly $4 billion a year to support programmes run by local experts in countries and communities in need. The fund allocated $1 million for the survey; a consortium was established with support from UNAID and local and international universities providing human resources and support.
Although HIV prevalence in the general population remains less than 1%, an increase in prevalence has been noted in all key populations with a risk of spread to the general population through sexual networks.
The HIV prevalence in various key populations: people who inject drugs (38.4%), transgender sex workers (7.5%), male sex workers (5.2%), male homosexuals (5.1%) and female sex workers (2.2%).
These startling revelations were made in a survey report of (HIV/AIDS) Integrated Biological & Behavioural Surveillance (IBBS) launched by Ministry of National Health Services, Regulation & Coordination (NHSR&C) on Tuesday.
While launching the IBBS report, the joint secretary, Ministry of National Health Services, Regulation & Coordination Syed Moazzam Ali, said that the M/o NHSR&C is fully cognisant of the epidemic trends in the country and the need to check the spread of the epidemic on war footings.
The ministry, with the support of development partners like UNAIDS, WHO and the active participation of the PLHIV community is combating the HIV AIDS epidemic on war footings, he added.
He said that the world has made significant progress in terms of alleviating the high morbidity and mortality associated with HIV AIDS.
Moazzam Ali said that the life-saving HIV treatment has been pivotal in reducing the number of new infections, improving the quality of life of people living with HIV and virtually eliminating mother to child transmission.
“Pakistan is committed to ending HIV by 2030, in line with the global sustainable development goals (SDGs) and has increased its investments to implement a high impact intervention scenario with a focused targeted approach to scale up testing in key populations and increase treatment uptake,” he vowed.
Neil Buhne, the resident coordinator of United Nations, said that Pakistan, as the IBBS shows, is at a crucial stage where HIV is growing but the capacity to reverse it also exists. He said that Pakistan can build on the result of the survey and the experience of the regional countries with high prevalence to scale-up the response.
Dr Mamadou Sakho, country director of UNAIDS Pakistan said that according to the last UNAIDS report on 2016, in the Asia Pacific region, India, China and Pakistan are among the 10 countries which account for more than 95 per cent of all new HIV infections. The Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia are among the others.
Identified by UNAIDS as one of 35 fast-track countries needing intensified efforts to fight HIV/AIDS, the government must roll out plans to close gaps in prevention, testing and treatment services.
Of the people who are suffering from this deadly virus, 50% are in Punjab, 43% in Sindh, 5% in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) and 2% in Baluchistan.
Pakistan must take the lead in research, innovation related to HIV (diagnostic/RDT, test & treatment), Dr Sakho said.
