N58,000 babies born with HIV in Nigeria yearly –UNIAIDS

United Nations Programme on HIV/ AIDS, UNIADS, yesterday revealed that Nigeria has 58,000 of her new-born infected with Human Immune Deficiency Virus, HIV, yearly. Executive Director, UNAIDS, Michel Sidibé, stated this in Abuja when he visited management of the National Agency for the Control of AIDS,
NACA. Sidibe, who is in Nigeria for three days, courtesy of Secretary General of the United Nations, to foster efforts to contain the disease, said more efforts should be committed to testing people and placing persons positive on treatment.
“If there is any one country where I should be today to be able to talk about ending this epidemic, it should be Nigeria, because if we fail to control the epidemic, it will be disastrous. “If we fail to quicken the pace and reach people, we may not be able to end the epidemic. We are in a defining moment. Nigeria has been able to demonstrate that result is possible; that we can see decline on new infections, that we can see decline on the number of persons who are dying from HIV/AIDS, that we can increase the number of people on treatment. “If we do not demonstrate that we are capable to achieve mother to child transmission at the federal level, at the state and local government levels and at every single place, it will be difficult.
“From data in our books, 58, 000 babies are born with HIV/AIDS every year in Nigeria. “We need to be able to make sure that we don’t have those babies born with HIV. We need to make sure that we have a new generation born without HIV. With that you would have been able to demonstrate, like I just said at all government levels. “We know that when babies are born with HIV, and these babies are not put on treatment, they have 50 per cent chances to die before their second birthday. He has 30 per cent chances of dying before his third birthday. That is a huge lost for Nigeria and Africa. “In Southern part of Africa, the epicentre of this epidemic where we were thinking that a country like even Botswana or Swaziland will disappear from the map, today they managed to ensure that they don’t have babies born with HIV. “South Africa used to have more babies than Nigeria. They had 70, 000 babies born with HIV every year.
In less than four years, they managed to reduce it to lesser than 60, 000. “So, it is possible that we could do the same thing in Nigeria. I am seeing the trend. We are seeing the positive pace. But we need to quicken the pace. We need to accelerate. “The second thing which I think is very important is that we should not be scared of paying today. If we don’t pay now, we will pay for ever. That is the real issue. “We are seeing that the epidemic in the North is almost controlled because when they put people on treatment, you reduce the infection by 96 per cent.
So, you are controlling the epidemic and you are about to eliminate it because the reservoir become so small. “That is why they are trying to reach 90, 90, 90, because the last 90 is to completely suppress the activities of the virus in your blood,” he said. He noted that Nigeria should be able to produce antiretroviral drugs that would be administered on people who are positive to HIV to help save their lives and reduce the costs of importation. According to him, Indian Pharmaceutical firms produce drugs that are used to cater for 85 percent of persons who are on treatment for the disease. He noted that Africa should be able to produce drug for treating HIV, and that Nigeria should be one of the best hubs for producing medicine not for only the region, but the entire continent