03 Aug 2015

Cases of HIV incidence have marginally reduced, NACA acting deputy national coordinator has said.

Mr Joseph Kefas said this during the Vision 2016 national stakeholder conference.

Presenting under the compassionate, just and caring nation pillar, Mr Kefas said in 2008, there were 1.45 per cent cases of incidence while in 2013 they registered 1.35 per cent. 

He said the difference was something notable as it represented 5 000 people.

“Coming from 15 000 to 10 000, that’s a reduction although 5 000 is still a big number. We are happy that it has levelled off.” He said they had infections taking place at lower ages such as 15-19. 

He said HIV prevention strategies world over, encouraged countries to delay the age at which young people first had sex and discourage premarital sexual activity. 

He said there was need for civil society to be engaged in social and behaviour change communication interventions with a focus on youth and key populations, including alcohol and substance abuse.

“There are Life-skill programmes in schools, and we recently launched Communities Acting Together to Control HIV (CATCH) to engage community leaders to engage the households as the custodians of the children.”

He said the financial gaps were another challenge, as funding bodies were prioritising their support, adding that Botswana being classified as upper middle class economy is disadvantaged. 

Mr Kefas said management of HIV/AIDS was expensive, adding that they had been relying on PEPFAR and government. 

He said recently Global Fund approved their Concept note of P270m and said the money will be shared among all the HIV/AIDS actors.

Mr Kefas said that they were happy that prevalence rate has reduced and so has AIDS mortality rate. He said this shows that treatment is functioning well. 

The official said before there were 22 000 AIDS related deaths while in 2013 they were just over 5 700 deaths. Mr Kefas said government is spending P400 million annually on people who are on treatment. Ends