RESEARCH ARTICLE
HIV Prevention: The Key to Ending AIDS by 2030
Nana K. Poku*
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2016Volume: 10
First Page: 65
Last Page: 77
Publisher ID: TOAIDJ-10-65
DOI: 10.2174/1874613601610010065
Article History:
Received Date: 27/02/2015Revision Received Date: 9/07/2015
Acceptance Date: 12/10/2015
Electronic publication date: 08/04/2016
Collection year: 2016
open-access license: This is an open access article licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial 4.0 International Public License (CC BY-NC 4.0)(https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/legalcode), which permits unrestricted, non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the work is properly cited.
Abstract
There is no viable substitute for re-energizing, funding and supporting culturally attuned, locally staffed HIV advocacy and prevention programmes, especially in resource poor settings. The evidence that such interventions are effective remains compelling; and although the cost implications are not negligible, the medium to long-term outcomes must be regarded not as complementary, but as integral, to biomedical interventions. The success of the anti-retroviral drugs upscale has enabled a noticeable improvement in AIDS related morbidity and mortality in the recent years; yet the underlying dynamics of the epidemic remains undetermined by the rate at which new infections are taking place in relation to the number of AIDS deaths. While the rate of new HIV infections is stabilising in some of the hardest hit countries, it remains far too high and the future cost of maintaining an ever-expanding pool of people reliant on daily drugs for survival is unsustainable. Countries must exercise caution in continuing to focus on treatment as a ‘quick fix’ to end AIDS as a public health concern. HIV is a socially culturally induced crisis and, as such, a variety of measures are needed simultaneously to appeal to different people, groups and circumstances.
