UNICEF reveals 360,000 adolescents likely to die of AIDS by 2030
The scourge of HIV/AIDS epidemic keeps rearing its ugly head around the world and young people are becoming the most affected victims.
A report by UNICEF has disclosed that about 360,000 adolescents are expected to die of AIDS-related diseases by 2030 if adequate efforts are not made to curtail the transmission of the disease.
The Executive Director of UNICEF, Henrietta Fore said that the world is beginning to lose focus in fighting the spread of AIDS, as progress is notably slow among adolescents between the ages of 10 and 19.
“Programmes to treat the virus and prevent it from spreading among older children are nowhere near where they should be,’’ Fore said.
Although there’s a growing awareness that has helped to reduce the rate of HIV transmission from mother to child, the success still falls below a remarkable level.
UNICEF indicates that an estimated number of 700 adolescents are being infected with HIV every day, which accounts for one new case in every two minutes. By 2030, about 1.9 million children and adolescents will be living with HIV and a bulk of these victims will be in Africa.
East and Southern Africa is expected to be the hardest hit with about 1.1 million patients, followed by 571,000 in West Africa, and 84,000 in both Latin America and the Caribbean.
Henrietta Fore stressed that “We must maintain the sense of urgency to sustain gains made in the past decade – for both boys and girls. And to do this we must look to innovative and preventative ways of reaching the most vulnerable and at-risk young people.”
To counter the impending disaster of losing such a high number of young people, UNICEF is planning to increase awareness and also encourage family-centred testing to identify the disease early by offering community outreach for adolescents.
It has also resolved to help tackle the failure in structural and behavioural patterns that have slowed down the progress of overcoming HIV/AIDS.
“We can’t win the fight against HIV if we don’t accelerate progress in preventing transmission to the next generation,” Fore concluded.
