Nigeria accounts for 15% AIDS- related deaths globally, says UNICEF
• Says 2.8 million children living with HIV globally • Ekiti pledges enabling environment for PLWHIV
THE United Nations Children’s Fund ( UNICEF) has said that about 15 per cent of the global AIDS- related deaths in children and adolescents occur in Nigeria. UNICEF also said in a report that every minute and 40 seconds, a child or young person under the age of 20 was newly infected with HIV last year, bringing the total number of children living with HIV globally to 2.8 million.
The report, released to The Guardian in Akure, yesterday, by the UNICEF Communication Officer, Lagos Office, Mrs. Blessing Ejiofor, said in Nigeria, about 22,000 new infections occurred in children aged 014 years in 2019, warning that children are being left behind in the fight against HIV.
“Prevention efforts and treatment for children remain some of the lowest among key affected populations. In 2019, a little more than half of children worldwide had access to life- saving treatment, significantly lagging behind coverage for both mothers ( 85 per cent) and all adults living with HIV ( 62 per cent).
“Nearly 110,000 children died of AIDS that year. In Nigeria, 13,000 children aged 0- 14 years died of AIDS- related causes in 2019.
“Despite some progress in the decades- long fight against HIV and AIDS, deep regional disparities persist among all populations, especially for children,” she said.
The UNICEF Nigeria Representative, Peter Hawkins, added: “Hundreds of thousands of children continue to suffer the impacts of the HIV epidemic.
“Children are still getting infected at alarming rates, and they are still dying from AIDS. Even with improvements in recent years, HIV treatment access for children and adolescents is unacceptably low, and much more need to be done to ensure children get the treatment they need and deserve.”
He said that COVID- 19 had
Minterrupted vital HIV treatment and prevention services globally, putting countless more lives at risk. EANWHILE, the Ekiti State government has reiterated its commitment towards creating an enabling environment for the People Living With HIV/ AIDS ( PLWHIV) in the state to survive.
It said that the state had low percentage of HIV/ AIDS records compared to any other state in the country. The state’s Commissioner for Health and Human Services, Dr. Oyebanji Filani, said that the state was commemorating the World AIDS Day, with the theme: “United to end AIDS in the Midst of COVID19,” to appreciate government’s efforts in the fight against the virus amid the present COVID- 19 pandemic. The commissioner, who was represented by a director in the ministry, Mr. Olusola Ajayi, said that despite the low rate of HIV status in the state, people still needed to carry out HIV/ AIDS test to know their status or any underlying health issues that could cause health challenge.