– Dr Shanti Singh
THE Ministry of Health’s National Aids Programme Secretariat, in partnership with Health Services 20/20 and USAID, on Wednesday last, hosted the HAPSAT Guyana Findings and Recommendations Stakeholders’ Meeting at Cara Lodge, Georgetown.
Through small group discussions, presentations and highly interactive sessions, stakeholders shared their knowledge and expertise for the purpose of strengthening the sustainability of the HIV/AIDS fight.
The high-level meeting sought to discuss the preliminary report on HIV/AIDS assessment among stakeholders.
From that assessment, the issue of stigma and discrimination and prevention services for vulnerable groups was highlighted as a priority for stakeholders.
Against this backdrop, Coordinator of NAPS, Dr. Shanti Singh opined that there have been many successes in eliminating HIV/AIDS in Guyana.
However, she related that more avenues for integration need to be explored as Guyana forges ahead in addressing sustainability.

Health Minister Dr. Leslie Ramsammy, in his remarks, noted that Guyana has already established, globally, the first milestone in the fight against HIV/AIDS. This is the trajectory that was embarked on, that is, zero mother-to-child transmission by 2015.

“We are sitting here this morning because we are indeed Change Agents. We are here to act. We are here to make a difference in people’s lives. It means then – delivering results, and the results to be delivered are clear. Guyana embarked on a trajectory of elimination some time ago and Guyana remains unequivocally committed to the UNAIDS global commitment to zero new transmission, zero mother-to-child transmission, zero deaths from HIV, zero stigma  and discrimination,” Ramsammy said.
Minister Ramsammy was delighted to report that COHSOD last week committed the Caribbean to this goal, thus Guyana no longer stands alone.
“The number of persons dying each year has been reduced, and people are living longer with HIV. Indeed HIV has been transformed from a deadly killer disease to a chronic disease… Health systems have been improved and this is having an impact on health in general and resource  mobilization has been successful”.
Guyana’s HIV programme provides high coverage quality services, but to continue to provide these levels of quality and coverage there is need to secure financial and human resources.
“We need to spend even more in the fight against HIV; how we do that is a major challenge, the challenge is not how to find ways to move money out of HIV, the challenge is how to ensure that the cost does not further escalate so that, as resources become more available in our country, we have similar kinds of commitments to the other public health challenges that face us”. (GINA)