Access to HIV and Aids Treatment Improving, says New Report

A new report from the World Health Organisation and its partners, including UNICEF, has found that access to antiretroviral treatment for HIV and Aids has increased significantly during 2006.

|PIC1|The report 'Towards universal access: scaling up priority HIV/AIDS interventions in the health sector' found that by the end of last year, more than two million HIV and Aids sufferers in low and middle income countries were receiving treatment - an increase of 54 per cent on 2005.

Aid agencies are currently running towards the goal of universal access to comprehensive prevention programmes, treatment, care and support for HIV by 2010.

The report outlined key weak areas that were hampering efforts to scale up access to HIV and Aids treatment to the 2010 target levels.

In particular, it found that only 11 per cent of pregnant women with HIV in low and middle income countries were receiving the necessary antiretroviral to prevent mother-to-child transmission.

WHO HIV and Aids Director, Dr Kevin De Cock, said that improving access to HIV treatment for children, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, remains as an "urgent" priority.

"Access to HIV testing and counselling, a critical entry point for both prevention and treatment services, also needs to be broadened significantly if we are to come near to reaching the targets of universal access by 2010," he said.

Nonetheless, real progress has been made, the report says. By December 2006, more than 1.3 million people in sub-Saharan Africa were receiving treatment - a massive increase in coverage to 28 per cent from just 2 per cent in 2003.

And in the last year, the number of children receiving treatment has doubled, although the children receiving treatment still remains at only 15 per cent of the number who actually need it.