AT its annual Appreciation Ceremony held on Friday last at the Cara Lodge, the National AIDS Programme Secretariat honored several individuals and organisations who dedicated their energies for a number of years to impact the fight against HIV/AIDS.Globally, World AIDS Day was observed recently on the 1st December and marked 26 years since the first AIDS case was discovered in Guyana, in 1987. This period also marked 21 years since the establishment of the National AIDS Programme Secretariat in 1992. For over two decades the NAPS has been working in unison with its partners, inter-sectoral ministries, NGOs, the private sector and other key stakeholders to prevent new infections and ensure universal access to treatment and care services.

NAPS Programme Manager, Dr. Shanti Singh-Anthony, in her address to the gathering remarked that Guyana is turning the tide against the HIV epidemic with fewer babies being born to HIV, less HIV infections and people living with HIV are living longer and healthier lives. Dr. Singh-Anthony affirmed that Guyana is well poised to declare the Elimination of Mother to Child Transmission.
Currently, more than 81 percent of persons living with HIV are reporting a 12 months survival and AIDS related deaths have decreased from almost 10percent in 2002 to less than 4percent in 2010, Dr. Singh-Anthony pointed out.
Importantly, a regional release from the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO) ranked Guyana as one of the seven countries to have achieved Universal access to HIV treatment with coverage of 93 percent. This places Guyana only two places behind Barbados and Cuba with 95 percent coverage.
Chief Medical Officer in the Ministry of Health Dr. Shamdeo Persaud who delivered remarks on behalf of the Minister of Health, emphasized the importance of the HIV response as demonstrated with the inclusion of HIV/AIDS as a health priority in Health Vision 20/20 Strategy.
It is only fitting therefore, that NAPS recognises individuals and organisations that have been serving relentlessly over the many years and contributed to the successes of the Guyana HIV/AIDS response.
Those receiving Long Standing Service Awards were Ms. Edris George, Programme Management Specialist USAID, Mr. Dereck Springer, Director of PANCAP Coordinating Unit, Ms. Desiree Edghill, Executive Director Artistes in Direct Support, Mr. Sean Wilson, Programme Officer, International Labour Organisation (ILO) and Mr. Nazim Hussain, Community Mobilisation Coordinator with the NAPS. Each individual served in HIV/AIDS for over a decade, some reaching over two decades. Three NGOs were awarded for making the greatest impact in reaching the key populations of men who have sex with men and female commercial sex workers. There were: Artistes in Direct Support of Region 4, United Bricklayers, New Amsterdam Berbice and Family, Awareness, Consciousness, Togetherness (FACT) of Springlands, Berbice.

The Secretariat also took time out to have a minute of silence in memory of the late South African leader Mr. Nelson Mandela, who died on Thursday last at the age of 95. AIDS in Africa has claimed more lives than the sum of all wars, famines and floods. Dr. Singh-Anthony reminded the gathering of one of Mandela’s famous speeches in 2004 where he called on the global community to act. She quoted him as saying, “the more we lack the courage and the will to act, the more we condemn to death our brothers and sisters, our children and our grandchildren. When the history of our times is written, will we be remembered as the generation that turned our backs in a moment of a global crisis or will it be recorded that we did the right thing?”