Regional experts convene in Barbados to review measures to end AIDS

Aug 29, 2017 News

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Eliminating the AIDS epidemic is within reach.
This assertion was yesterday amplified by Professor Clive Landis at the opening ceremony of the Caribbean Cytometry and Analytical Society’s [CCAS] expert summit.

“We know we are on the brink of being able to eliminate the AIDS epidemic,” said Professor Landis who serves as the CCAS Chairperson.
Professor Landis amplified during his deliberations that there still exists a gap between what the HIV experts know and what the public knows. He observed, “The public is still terrified of this disease and sees it as a death sentence. We have to challenge misconceptions and the fear that is driving stigmatizing attitudes of people with HIV.”
“Fear and stigma rule hearts and minds, blocking people from learning their status and blocking them from getting and staying on treatment. If we recast the public health message and give people clear information, attitudes can turn around,” Professor Landis asserted.
The summit, which is being held under the theme “From Care to Cure – Shifting the HIV Paradigm”, commenced yesterday at the Almond Beach Resort in Speightstown, Barbados and is slated to culminate on Thursday.
CCAS is a registered HIV Charity, comprising volunteers from the University of the West Indies, the Barbados Ministry of Health and the private sector. The mandate of the CCAS is to train and educate healthcare providers for improved diagnosis, monitoring and treatment of HIV and AIDS in the Caribbean region by removing technical and social barriers to care. CCAS’s annual HIV/AIDS regional workshop rotates through the region and has trained more than 1,250 HIV/AIDS specialists from over 20 countries.
The regional and international HIV experts who are currently attending the summit have been tasked with developing strategies to engage the Caribbean on the ‘treatment as prevention’ approach to HIV care, which will put the region on track to end the AIDS epidemic.
According to UNAIDS, “treatment as prevention” is an approach to HIV treatment which forms the basis of a global commitment to end the AIDS epidemic by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. It is hinged on the finding that diagnosing and treating people early and lowering the level of the virus in their blood to undetectable levels [viral suppression] virtually eliminates the risk that they will transmit HIV to other people.
As such, HIV treatment best practices now calls for people to start treatment immediately after being diagnosed, regardless of how far the illness has progressed. Treating people living with HIV fully so that they achieve viral suppression not only keeps them healthy, but dramatically reduces their infectiousness, UNAIDS has amplified.
UNAIDS Director for Latin America and the Caribbean, Dr. César Núñez, noted that through the 2016 Political Declaration on ending AIDS, United Nations members states have agreed to adopt a fast-track strategy that involves increasing prevention, testing and treatment services while working to eliminate stigma and discrimination.
Central to this goal are the 90-90-90 treatment targets, that is, 90 percent of people living with HIV knowing their status, 90 percent of diagnosed people on treatment and 90 percent of people on treatment with an undetectable viral load. However, countries’ ability to achieve these targets will depend on the success of their work with partners including civil society to remove barriers to ensure that no one is left behind.
“People continue to get diagnosed late or die due to AIDS-related causes when testing and treatment services are available. Our reality is that the potential impact of game-changing scientific advances is being undermined by ignorance, fear, shame, prejudice and exclusion,” Dr. Núñez said.
Dr. Núñez has moreover called for partnerships to conduct more research on Caribbean HIV epidemics including epidemiological surveillance, zero-prevalence and key population studies. This, he said, would help countries better respond to the unique characteristics of their epidemics. He further called for strategies to address the specific vulnerabilities of young people, men, women, migrants, men who have sex with men, sex workers, transgender people, people who use drugs, prisoners and homeless people.
Distinguished Speaker of the opening ceremony yesterday, Dr. Deanna Kerrigan of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, shared the findings of a study involving female sex workers living with HIV in the Dominican Republic. Dr. Kerrigan noted that stigma and discrimination, violence and substance abuse negatively impacted the sex workers’ treatment outcomes. However, these challenges could be addressed through a multifaceted approach that combined psycho-social support, activities that encouraged solidarity and supportive government policies, she explained.
Moreover, over the next few days the “Care to Cure” summit will explore other strategies to maximize the impact of HIV treatment, particularly among key populations.

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