Over 54,000 people living with HIV

PAPUA New Guinea has 54,845 people living with HIV/AIDS with the fear of an increase in the coming National General Election period next year, says National AIDS Council Secretariat (NACS) acting director Tony Lupiwa.
Lupiwa said an increase came after the Health Department withdrew its funding in 2013 and partners such as UNAIDS and HIV were unable to be brought in.
“In 2002, the record was 2.5 per cent and we were able to cut it down to 0.65 per cent in 2013, because we were working as a team with the support of donor partners, development partners such as UNAIDS and we were giving funds out to community groups, church group and other groups,” he said.
However, Lupiwa said with the increase in the number of people living with HIV/AIDS, three people died daily and had been doing so since 2013. “Nine people are diagnosed every day,” he said.
He also stated that the Government had allocated funds to the provinces and districts but were not working together to support the HIV programmes.
“Provinces and districts are not working together to support the programme, NACS is now trying to make changes to the laws that govern the secretariat and we are putting up a big budget plan for the National General Election,” he said.
The National AIDS Council Secretariat and joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS and Health Department representatives met during a two-day workshop on key population issues regarding HIV/AIDS and was attended by the provincial health authorities (PHA), faith-based organisation (FBO) leaders and health managers in Port Moresby.
“The purpose of the workshop is to educate and equip all health managers, PHA and FBO leaders with knowledge and skills to enable them to provide health services that support and adequately cater for health care needs of those at greatest risk of HIV and sexual transmission infections,” Lupiwa said.