Collateral effect. The fight against HIV, which had progressed considerably over the past ten years, has been slowed down by the appearance of Covid-19, warned the World Health Organization on Tuesday, December 7. WHO calls for these two pandemics to be combated simultaneously. Many countries have fallen behind international targets “and the difficulties linked to Covid-19 made the situation worse”, the WHO said in a statement.
The global goal is to end AIDS as a threat to public health by 2030. According to data from the International Conference on AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Infections, which is currently being held in South Africa, only nine countries are on track to meet the target: Botswana, Cape Verde, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Nigeria, Uganda, Rwanda and Zimbabwe.
“The face of HIV is still overwhelmingly that of a black woman”South African Health Minister Joe Phaahla said in a speech at the opening of the conference. Sub-Saharan Africa is home to two-thirds (67%) of people living with HIV, according to the UN, and women and girls account for 63% of new infections. With 7.8 million cases, South Africa is the most affected country in the world.
The Covid-19 “has made the fight against HIV even more difficult, but one virus must not take precedence over another”, warned Dr Matshidiso Moeti, director of WHO Africa. The number of new infections had fallen by 43% over the past decade and the number of deaths had fallen by almost half. To date, 37.7 million people are living with the virus, according to the UN. In 2020, 680,000 people died from AIDS-related illnesses.