Health professionals demand removal of HIV/AIDS stigma

Timothy

Health professionals have demanded that the insurance industry removes stigma on HIV/AIDS, Health Minister Julius Timothy has said.

Members of the insurance industry in the Caribbean and health care professionals met in Port of Spain, Trinidad this week to discuss how Caribbean health insurance companies can reduce discrimination against people living with HIV.

“Whenever you are going to take any insurance policy and they ask have you ever had or do you have AIDS? Once you say yes, then you are automatically not insured. We want that stigma removed from AIDS,” Timothy said, after the meeting.

He and other health care professionals have called for insurance companies to treat AIDS like any other of the CNCDs or chronic non communicable diseases.  “You should not say no to someone who has had AIDS,” Timothy added.

The insurance and health forum was meant to build partnerships between the insurance industry and public health sectors, to enhance access of HIV victims to treatment. The Pan Caribbean Partnership against HIV and AIDS (PANCAP), the Insurance Association of the Caribbean and the Pan Caribbean Business Coalition organized the forum.

Timothy said insurance companies will be monitored and it is hoped in the next few months they will start treating those living with HIV/AIDS fairly.

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7 Comments

  1. May 31, 2014

    Ideally I think I would be wonderful if insurance companies would insure people with AIDS.

    But would it not drive the cost of insurance up for everybody if companies began insuring HIV/AIDS victims?

    If the law allows there will always be companies that will refuse to insure people with AIDS. Because their premiums will be lower they will be getting the clients.

    While the insurance issue is being debated homosexual groups continue to lobby governments for gay rights. Governments are decriminalizing buggery and AIDS continues to spread with very little progress being made in stropping the most deadly yet most preventable disease known to man.

    Sincerely, Rev. Donald Hill. International Evangelist.

  2. Jaime Lewis
    August 15, 2011

    Caribbean governments must pass legislation that makes it illegal for insurance companies to discriminate against people who have the HIV virus. This discrimination must be a punishable crime. Only then will that level of discrimination end.

    • June 4, 2014

      Why should straight people be forced to pay more for insurance to accommodate homosexuals? If insurance companies are forced to insure those most apt to contact HIV/AIDS and those who already have tested positive, these people are going to have to pay more for their own insurance.

      If this happens homosexuals are going to be screaming discrimination. But of course it would not be discrimination. It would be common sense. Smokers pay more for insurance.
      They don’t call it discrimination. But unfortunately this kind of common sense is lacking among those who think it is their “basic human right” to bugger other men.

      Sincerely, Rev. Donald Hill. International Evangelist.

  3. love da
    August 13, 2011

    Sir where are the french doctors you told us that would be coming to Dominica to assist in our health system? You guys are just a bunch of liars that need to be put in a barrel and toss into sea. Stop fooling the people.

  4. Evolved
    August 12, 2011

    Wow – this is definitely the best article or piece of news I have read on this site in a long time – Insurance companies in the Caribbean cannot continue to discriminate against persons living with HIV – they cannot be allowed to get away with this – the certainly cannot do it in any first world countries

  5. Patience
    August 12, 2011

    LOL. Mr Minister of HEALTH, HIV/AIDS is not a CNCD, it is a communicable disease.
    But i agree with the initiative.

  6. ......
    August 12, 2011

    tomothy what do u have to say about ex press secretary Sean Douglas statement?

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