Prevention and treatment were listed as key areas in the NSP goals. Some of the targets included reducing new HIV infections by 50% by 2011, actively reducing the rate of mother to child transmission and providing treatment, care and support to 80% of those infected.
The Free State was recently in the news when thousands of patients died while waiting for antiretroviral (ARV) treatment after the provincial government announced a moratorium on treatment. In the months that followed the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) also released a report that revealed the province had condom shortages.
TAC, Section27 (formerly the Aids Law Project) and partners demanded for the province to implement the updated treatment guidelines and the HIV counselling and testing (HCT) campaign at provincial and district level.
‘National government has shown the political will to address the HIV epidemic. This must be translated into political will and action at the provincial and district level,’ the statement said.
They demanded that the Free State implement the following:
1. Establish a functional provincial AIDS council and implement the provincial strategic plan.
2. Establish and/or strengthen local and district AIDS councils and develop and implement district health plans.
3. The province must implement the monitoring and evaluation tool developed last year and strengthen monitoring and evaluation of the antiretroviral therapy and prevention of mother to child transmission programmes.
4. AIDS-denialism, which has been clearly banished at a national level, is unacceptable at a provincial level and must be removed from rhetoric.
