Figueroa
Trudy Simpson, Staff Reporter
LOCAL INTERVENTIONS to reduce HIV and AIDS transmission may have prevented about 100,000 Jamaicans becoming infected.
But health officials are worried that despite interventions, the epidemic is growing and that less than 10 per cent of the estimated 7,000 HIV-positive Jamaicans, who need anti-retroviral treatment (drugs to fight HIV), are receiving medication.
Dr. Peter Figueroa, Chief, Epidemiology and AIDS in the Ministry of Health, speaking at yesterday's weekly luncheon of the Rotary Club of Kingston, said only 400 to 500 people were receiving the drugs and majority through private means, because Jamaica does not have a system under which persons can access such drugs in the public health sector.
He reiterated the Ministry's statements that it is hoping to establish public access to anti-retrovirals as soon as the island gets US$7 million, the first disbursement of a US$23 million grant approved earlier this year for Jamaica by the United Nations Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.
"It appears as if we are now turning that corner. It will still take a few months to put in place because there are several steps that we have to go through, including satisfying the Global Fund that we can manage the funds adequately. We are really hoping that in the next several months we will have this (public accessss programme) in place," Dr. Figueroa said.
He stressed that persons cannot miss even one dose of anti-retorvirals once they start or this will lead to drug resistance and the need to find new or more expensive drugs.
It currently costs persons between $5,000 and $10,000 per month to buy drugs, do diagnostic tests and cover other expenses but Dr. Figueroa said the costs of the drugs are decreasing.
During the luncheon, Dr. Figueroa also pointed to a survey carried out among 600 persons in Montego Bay, St. James, which identified about 400 sites, including church buildings, where persons can meet potential sex partners.
"What is an insight for us is that it is not only night clubs and the massage parlours and the go-go clubs where people go. They go to the market place, to the taxi stand, to the mall, church activities... Wherever people go apparently some people are looking for new partners," Dr. Figueroa told the luncheon. This, he continued, "was an important insight for us because what it means is that we have got to broaden our approach in relation to targeting those areas where people are gathered to really get the prevention message through."
A similar study, being done using a new approach called place methodology, is currently under way in Kingston.
Dr. Figueroa said that on the positive side, statistics show there has been a decline in risky behaviour; for example between 1992 and 2000, the island recorded a 10 per cent drop, from 59 to 49 per cent, in the number of men who said they had multiple partners within the previous year.
But there is still a gap between what people know about HIV prevention and their behaviour and the need to reduce stigma and discrimination against persons living with the illness, he said.
In addition, he said the survey showed not all the support mechanisms are in place. "There was a gap between the opportunity to prevent transmission and what was actually being done. At many of these sites, condoms were not available. Something as simple as that although people were meeting (potential) sex partners," Dr. Figueroa said.
