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| Al-Soub: Qatar makes progress |
Despite Qatar’s unprecedented population growth over the last decade, the HIV prevalence rate, estimated at less than 0.02% of the total population, is quite low, a senior consultant at the Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) said yesterday.
Dr Hussam al-Soub, consultant at the infectious diseases department at HMC said “Qatar is epidemiologically classified as a country with low HIV prevalence with an average of 10 new cases diagnosed per year.
Addressing the Qatar Symposium on Aids in the Mena region, which was attended by delegates from UNAids, Unicef, the Doha International Institute for Family Studies and Development and many other institutions with a stake in the fight against HIV/Aids, al-Soub said: “The cumulative number of HIV/Aids cases reported through 2010 was 254. The number of people living with HIV followed up by health delivery services are 84.” He also said the main mode of transmission is heterosexual contact.
In his presentation, he explained that the national response initially focused on the medical and clinical aspects of the disease trying to slow HIV spread, including comprehensive health delivery services to people living with the disease, counselling and advice, working closely with high risk groups to limit its spread in the work place, holding several workshops and reviewing schools’ curriculum related to HIV.
He said treatment with antiretroviral drugs is available free of charge to Qataris and expatriates and that there is no set policy on whether expatriates who contract the disease will be deported, as the matter is dealt with on a case by case basis.
Dr al-Soub said Qatar has made tangible progress towards the UN Millennium Development Goal 6, which addresses HIV/Aids targets of halting and reversing the spread of HIV/Aids by 2015, and “achieving universal access to HIV/Aids treatment for all those who need it by 2010.”
The expert said current efforts to address the issue include advocacy and sensitisation campaigns, training for care providers, development of referral systems and upgrading facilities to ensure privacy for people living with Aids.
A key area of concern is decreasing HIV/Aids-related stigma, which can often prevent people from coming forward to have themselves tested or treated. The stigma also affects healthcare providers, who can be as susceptible to discrimination against people with HIV/Aids as members of the public.
Dr al-Soub says hospitalisation for HIV/Aids patients has declined through effective treatment and maintenance of the disease.
He said that community advocacy, targeted at both men and women, is still needed to address underlying issues behind the epidemic. Insufficient training has meant counsellors were embarrassed when faced with this particular disease, as cultural barriers can impair discussion of issues around sexuality.
A focus of the conference, which concluded yesterday, was the role of families in tackling the HIV/Aids epidemic, which has been in decline around the world except in the Mena region and Eastern Europe where stigmas around the disease often prevent adequate screening and treatment.
In the Mena region, the number of cases of HIV infection among children younger than 14 years old has tripled in the last eight years, with a total of 200,000-600,000 new infections across all ages.