HAVING, a few years ago, introduced a strategic plan dubbed the ‘National Week of Testing’, to help stamp-out stigma and discrimination associated with the Human Immuno-deficiency Virus (HIV), while at the same time encouraging people to know their status, the Ministry of Health believes that its objectives have been achieved.

As a result, that Ministry collaborated with the National AIDS Programme Secretariat (NAPS) on Monday in making the decision to ‘scale down’ its national HIV testing activities, which are usually undertaken on an annual basis at the end of November.
According to Head of NAPS, Dr Shanti Singh, it was during a meeting to assess the progress of the country’s AIDS programme that a plan was amplified to reduce the activity to three days. She declared, “We have achieved what we wanted to as it relates to the National Week of Testing.”
The three days of testing activities will be engaged this month end, commencing three days before the observance of World AIDS Day, and will be done under the theme “Zero Stigma”.
World AIDS Day is observed on December 1, and will embrace the theme “Zero stigma, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths,” according to Dr Shanti Singh, who added that this move comes at a time when the Health Ministry is seeking to “embrace a transition plan” that would allow it to address HIV/AIDS without donor support.
Support is currently forthcoming from the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and the Global Fund 45.
At the moment, a Transition Committee, managed by the Permanent Secretary and the Chief Medical Officer of the Health Ministry, is addressing sustainability issues of the National AIDS Programme with a view to outlining priority measures to be implemented locally.
Dr Singh revealed that the Health Ministry has already taken steps to assume full management of its National AIDS Programme, which, according to her, will take a great deal of time and extensive planning before coming to fruition.