By Someone Boyce
Minister of Health, Khumbize Kandodo Chiponda, said the country has registered tremendous success in the fight against HIV and AIDS in many areas.
The minister was speaking in Blantyre during commemorations of World AIDS Day which falls on 1st December annually.
Among others, Chiponda cited the minimisation of mother-to-child transmission of HIV, the increased number of HIV-positive people who are on ARVs and the introduction of PREP as some of the successes.
Said Kandodo: “We have achieved a lot from where we are coming from, in the country we have almost over one million Malawians who are HIV positive but most of them are living a very productive life because they are on ARVs, we have also minimized mother to child transmission.”
One of the commissioners at the National AIDS Commission (NAC), Maclan Kakhomba, added that the number of new infections has drastically reduced.
“We have managed to reduce the number of new HIV infections from 99,000 in the year 2000 to as low as 17,000 in 2021 so this is good news in the fight against the scourge,” said Kakhomba.
The Ministry of Health has since launched a revised HIV AIDS Policy that has been designed to reduce the spread of HIV among the youth.
The theme for this year’s World AIDS day commemorations is: ‘Equitable Access to Quality HIV Services for All’.
