The process of developing a National HIV/AIDS policy to guide critical decisions relating to HIV/Aids for Dominica ,has begun to take shape.
Several stakeholders earlier this week, participated in an HIV/AIDS national policy development consultation at the Prevost Cinemall.
Speaking at the Consultation Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of
Health Helen Royer said while the strides made in tackling the HIV/Aids epidemic have been tremendous and constant, it can no longer be business as usual.
She warned that the HIV/Aids problem remains a major development crisis that affects all sectors worldwide.
“Actually during the last two decades the HIV/Aids epidemic has spread insistently affecting people in all walks of life and decimating the most productive segments at the population particularly between women and men between the ages of 20 and 49”.Royer told stakeholders.
She said the development of the national Aids policy will therefore require a national response which must be multisectoral and multidisciplinary.
Meantime, Coordinator of the national HIV/AIDS prevention unit Nurse Julie Frampton says policies and legislation are required to prevent unfair discrimination against people living with HIV/ Aids in work places including government departments. Frampton says there also needs to be appropriate implementation of HIV/AIDS prevention programs.
“The HIV/Aids epidemic raises many human rights issues that require clear policy and legal responses by governments”.she declared
The proposed National HIV/Aids policy is expected to be drafted and sent to government before year end.
An HIV comprehensive plan should address prevention at all angles: medication, Viral load suppression, mother to child transmission, issues around zero discortant couples
i was going to say why would you tell you boss you have aids..but Dominica so small…everybody knows everybody business…they probably know you aids test result before you
she should warn that the rate of infection is highest among blacks……….black women and black gay men are the two groups with the highest infection rate
the rate of infection among these two groups is alarming when compared to other groups….
Do you believe that black women are having sex with black gay men? If you do … you are seriously misguided. Black women are getting AIDS from black heterosexual men … duh! The Caribbean is second behind sub-Saharan Africa in AIDS. It’s past time to look at the culture of sex in the Caribbean. The old style kills!
Carol:
I have not seen the stats so I cannot give you any percentages but I have read enough to be able to say…
MANY women with HIV were infected by gay (bi) men.
Yes, some were infected by heterosexual men. But unless these men were drug users who were infected by using a needle after an HIV positive person – or by a contaminated blood transfusion -they were infected by another woman who had sex with a bi-sexual man.
There is no risk of HIV or any other sexually transmitted infection in a committed monogamous marriage. Fornication, adultery, and homosexuality
are unhealthy practices. They are forbidden in the Bible. God gave us these laws to protect us and guide us into the best life human beings can possibly have.
Sincerely, Rev. Donald Hill. Pentecostal Evangelist.