Females in Central Uganda hide from HIV/AIDS treatment

By; Ben Musanje

17^th October 2019

Central Uganda has been named as part of the country with the highest number of pregnant mothers living with HIV/AIDS and reject taking of Antiretroviral drugs (ARVs) as per the prescriptions.

The Head of HIV Prevention in the Uganda Aids Commission (UAC) Dr. Daniel Byamukama, says this has affected the Mother to Child HIV Prevention program and instead increased the number of babies born with the epidemic.

According to him, only 223 in Buganda and 259 in Busonga picked the drugs yet 86% and 69 % respectively rejected the ARVs last year.

Meanwhile, Dr. Byamukama indicates that girls and young ladies living with HIV most of them are rapped and don’t access the Pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) treatment.

Uganda lost the battle against HIV/AIDS in the 2000s unlike in the 1990s when the presidential campaign through the media and public gatherings sunk in people’s minds and HIV/AIDS prevalence levels reduced from 18% to 6% but it has stagnated.

Recent reviews indicated that the burden is still huge with 1000 people getting newly infected with HIV and 500 people dying of AIDS related illness every week.

This was revealed by the minister for presidency Esther Mbayo during the launch of “End Aids 2030 Uganda campaign, at Uganda media centre as part of presidential fast track initiatives launched in 2017, which aims at ending HIV/AIDS by 2030 in Uganda.