Sh257.91b for treatment of children living with HIV

May 11, 2012

Government has been asked to approve the shs257.91 billion proposed budget for the elimination of HIV/AIDS in children in the financial year Sh2012/2013.

By Violet Nabatanzi

Government has been asked to approve the shs257.91 billion proposed budget for the elimination of HIV/AIDS in children in the financial year Sh2012/2013.

 Speaking at a press conference in Kampala organized by civil society organizations, the Country Director of International HIV/AIDS Alliance in Uganda Leonard Okello said; out of Sh216.77Billion proposed budget for elimination of pediatric HIV for the last financial year only Sh100 Billion was approved leaving a shortfall of Sh116.66bn.

About 353 people are infected with HIV virus every day, 60 percent are women of reproductive age and 25,000 newborns get the virus from their mothers every year.

However the target of the Country’s virtual elimination plan is to cut rates of HIV transmission from 18 percent to less than 5 percent by 2015 and to reduce HIV-related deaths by 90 percent in infants and children under 5.

 “The government has announced its commitment to double the number of new patients on treatment. However a funding shortfall means this bold target will not be achieved and resource mobilization is urgently needed in order to address this crisis,” Okello said.

He also called upon development partners to deliver their pledges to eliminate pediatric HIV and dramatically scale up access to HIV treatment.

Executive Director National Community of women living with HIV/AIDS, Florence Buluba said “Elimination of mother to child transmission (EMTCT) programme has not reached certain areas and yet women are HIV positive, at the end of the day they are the ones being labeled as the cause of the infections,”

 She added that government should enough health personnel at the health centers in the villages. “At the grassroots this is a disaster you find one health worker addressing hundred patients,” Buluba added.

 

 

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