Youngest Crucial to Anti-HIV Efforts: UNAIDS Chief
By Alan Mozes
Originally published by Reuters Health, May 10, 2002
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) — Global efforts to fight HIV and AIDS must focus on children, the chief of the United Nations' office on the disease told world leaders Friday on the final day of the UN Special Session on Children.
"Young people must be at the center of the response to AIDS," said Dr. Peter Piot, executive director of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), at a press conference following his UN address. "Growing up today is totally different from what it was when I was young and what it was 20 years ago—because of AIDS."
Sitting on a panel with UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy and three young AIDS activists from Kenya, Haiti and Macedonia, Piot said that governments around the world must recognize that AIDS is now essentially a "young epidemic"—noting that about half of all new infections globally strike people younger than 24.
UNAIDS statistics indicate that every day 6,000 boys and girls between the ages of 15 and 24 and 2,000 children under age 15 become infected with HIV. Every day, 1,600 children die of AIDS.
"And every day, 6,000 children are left orphaned by AIDS," Piot added. He noted that one third of these orphans are younger than 5, while two-thirds must fend for themselves and their families as stigmatized "heads of the household."
Before the UN General Assembly, Piot demanded that announcements and documents outlining public health goals be backed up with real action. He recommended scaling up mother-to-child transmission prevention programs, which currently reach only 5% of women in sub-Saharan Africa; ensuring AIDS orphans access to school, food and jobs; and expanding HIV education programs so children can obtain prevention information while being spared the social stigma that often accompanies the disease.
"HIV/AIDS is virtually reversing the (health) progress made among kids around the world," added Bellamy. She noted that working on AIDS prevention, education and treatment is now a "very important, very key component" of UNICEF's overall mission to focus on children's health issues.
Bellamy seconded Piot's contention that controlling AIDS among young people is the key to controlling HIV in the wider population and minimizing the impact of AIDS on international efforts to address other health concerns. "UNICEF has been long involved in child survival…(so) for us, fighting HIV/AIDS is a high, high, high priority."
Inviolata Mmbwavi—a 28-year-old Kenyan AIDS counsellor and member of her country's National AIDS Control Council—told Reuters Health that she was optimistic the UN conference would raise awareness about AIDS and make a difference. Mmbwavi, who was infected with HIV during her first sexual encounter at age 19, stressed that everyone concerned about children's health and welfare must pay attention to AIDS. The disease affects children living in the relative comfort of North America as well as those living in poorer parts of the world, she said.
"We live in a global village now," she added. "And if those who are not infected take care of themselves then there is a chance of them taking care of those infected. And it's not just a health issue. It's a security issue, it's an economic issue."
Piot concluded by expressing hope that if government leaders strengthen their focus on HIV and its youngest victims, AIDS can be stopped in its tracks. "In every single country where AIDS had been brought under control it has begun with young people," he said. He noted that Cambodia, Brazil and Uganda have made progress in cutting AIDS infection rates by zeroing in on people who are just becoming sexually active. "So success is possible," he said. "This is a problem with a solution. And we know it works."
