No discrimination to HIV carriers: Deputy PM

Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam yesterday called for people not to discriminate against people living with HIV at a meeting held by Vietnamese Ministry of Health and the People’s Committee in the northern province of Hai Duong.
 
No discrimination to HIV carriers: Deputy PM
The meeting was organized in response to the National Action Month for HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control (November 10 – December 11) themed “early test – Effort to achieve 90-90-90 goal in 202” and the World AIDS Day (December 1)
Deputy PM Dam lauded efforts made by related agencies, unions and people in HIV/AIDS prevention mission to reduce the number of infected people and the mortality rate, adding that Vietnam is the first country in the Asia-Pacific region to pledge to carry out the United Nations 90-90-90 Goals by 2020.
Before, he said, 90 percent of expenditure for HIV/AIDS prevention had been sponsored by international organizations. However, this was cut gradually; therefore, the government will allocate more sum for preventive activities including issuing health insurance cards to HIV carriers.
To achieve the goal, Vietnam needs to implement preventive measures against the disease. People’s awareness of the disease should be raised so that they will not discriminate HIV carriers. Moreover, agencies should facilitate people living with HIV or people at risk for HIV infection to be treated with ARV.
According to the Department for HIV/AIDS prevention under the Ministry of Health, around 10,000 fresh cases of HIV infections are discovered in the country annually. The disease is one of leading causes of burden in Vietnam. Increasing HIV transmissions are mostly through sexual acts; therefore, the control is becoming more and more difficult.
Nearly 10,000 new HIV infection cases are discovered in the country, mostly via sex. This year is the 10th consecutive year that the numbers of newly-discovered HIV infection, transmissions to full-blown AIDS and AIDS-caused deaths in Vietnam have decreased.
The UN 90-90-90 Goals mean that by 2020, 90 percent of all people living with HIV will know their HIV status, 90 percent of all people with diagnosed HIV infection will receive sustained antiretroviral (ARV) therapy while 90 percent of all people receiving antiretroviral therapy will have viral suppression.

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