BASSETERRE, St. Kitts, July 22nd 2014 (CUOPM) – The Caribbean aspires to be become the first region in the world to end AIDS.
St. Kitts and Nevis’ Prime Minister the Rt. Hon. Dr. Denzil L. Douglas also told the 20th International AIDS Conference in Melbourne, Australia on Tuesday there is need for AIDS to be positioned within the broad context of health, poverty and equality.
“Let it be or clarion call resonating at SIDS, at the UN General Assembly, in every region and every country. Let us acknowledge that we have made much progress but AIDS is far from over. Let us continue to advocate for AIDS to be retained in the post 2015 development agenda. Let us harness resources and foster international solidarity to crack the intractable barriers. Let us resolve to end AIDS by 2030,” said Prime Minister Douglas, who is also the Lead Spokesman o HIV/AIDS in the CARICOM Community.
In his messages to thousands at the Conference, Prime Minister Douglas said the first is to consolidate the alliance to jointly eliminate poverty and HIV.
“Emerging from this alliance are three complementary elements that SIDS must take into consideration. They include: aligning health and development efforts around country-led, time-bound goals towards ending extreme poverty and AIDS; identifying targetsfor ending AIDS alongside the goal of universal health coverage for improving health services and health outcomes; and promoting national, regional and global monitoring and implementation research as critical components of sound policy making. In this regard a recent Lancet publication estimated that up to 24 percent of economic growth in low and middle income countries was due to better health outcomes and at the same time, yield 9-20 fold return on investments in health,” said Dr. Douglas.
He pointed out that the second message is the creation of viable partnerships aimed at sustainable development.
“Sustainable development of Small Island Development states, the theme of the Conference, can be achieved through international cooperation and partnerships of various kinds. In the case of the Caribbean, this is not only limited to North-South relations but also embraces South-South Cooperation,” said Dr. Douglas, providing that these are illustrated by Brazil’s provision of ARVs for people living with HIV collaboration to Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS).
He said cooperation between the CARICOM Community and the African Union on shared responsibility with the support of UNAIDS with a view to establishing roadmaps for both regions for reducing dependency and thereby enhancing the viability of programmes designed to end AIDS.
“For the Caribbean we have learnt the need to create indigenous regional structures rooted in the integration process that link community efforts with leadership at the highest political level. In this case, the Pan Caribbean Partnership against HIV and AIDS (PANCAP) has demonstrated what SIDS networks can achieve through collective efforts,” said Dr. Douglas.
The third lesson he told participants is to sustain and reconfigure the unfinished MDGs within the post 2015 Sustainable Development Goads (SDGs).
“The progress in attaining the international targets in the MDGs among SIDS shows marked improvements over the past decade. However the recently released gap analysis undertaken by UNAIDS demonstrates at least for the Caribbean, the need for more robust financing models based on shared responsibility, accelerated and affordable treatment regimens and accenting the elimination of HIV related stigma and discrimination to arrest the economic regression that will occur if the gains are not sustained and accelerated in the post-2015 era. The UN General Assembly special Event, in September 2013, Toward achieving the MDG’s in which I had an opportunity to participate, provided a clear consensus around the intrinsic links between poverty eradication and promotion of sustainable development,” said Prime Minister Douglas.
“Move beyond the MDGs with resolve to end AIDS,” is the fourth lesson, said Prime Minister Douglas, pointing out that the rapid scale-up of HIV treatment remains one of the most inspiring achievements in global health history.
Since 2001, the number of people receiving HIV treatment in low- and middle-income countries has risen from a mere handful to more than 12 million in early 2014. These advances are saving lives, with the number of AIDS-related deaths falling by 30% from 2005 to 2012 worldwide. They are also preventing new HIV infections, with antiretroviral therapy demonstrating the greatest prevention benefit of any biomedical prevention tool studied to date in randomized controlled trials.
He noted that with antiretroviral therapy as a key element of a strategic combination of prevention tools, the world now has the potential for ending the AIDS epidemic and making HIV transmission a rare event.
However, to make this a reality, the transformative potential of antiretroviral therapy has yet to be fully realized due to failure to bring HIV treatment to all those who need it. As of December 2012, only 34% of people eligible for treatment under the 2013 World Health Organization consolidated antiretroviral guidelines were receiving antiretroviral therapy.
“Applying these new guidelines, the figure on access in the Caribbean hovers around 50 percent. We therefore support the call from the UNDP Global Commission for Human Rights and HIV to make access to affordable treatment a human rights prerequisite which would apply equally to other communicable and non-communicable health emergencies,” said Prime Minister Douglas.
His fifth message is: Adopt a holistic approach to post 2015 Global health applying the lessons learned from the AIDS response.
“My sense is, that this Conference rightly supports the UNAIDS call for Ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030. And from my perspective and our experience in the Caribbean this is not only possible but imperative for stimulating action. Indeed the Caribbean plans to be the first region in the World to eliminate AIDS. We did this for polio and small pox in the late 1980s and can do so for AIDS. But the message for SIDS must ensure that HIV sensitive targets and indicators arealigned with other goals in areas such health, gender, youth climate change and human security. It must also ensure that there is convergence with joint action from the community to the global levels and with policies that focus on the social, economic and environmental determinants of HIV, poor health, poverty and equality,” said Prime Minister Douglas.
The range of topics at this conference such as HIV and ageing; development of an efficient early HIV infant diagnosis programme to ensure universal access to HIV and Health Systems; and building safe and sustainable cities, among others, reflectconcerns with human development.
The Prime Minister’s sixth and final message to the 20th International AIDS Conference is to Make Justice for All a fundamental requirement for getting to zero discrimination as the ultimate of human development.
“I mention this mainly because we in the Caribbean have identified the elements of Justice for All as our overarching inclusive strategy. The programme coordinated by PANCAP in collaboration with national governments and UNAIDS involved parliamentarians, faith leaders, youth, civil society and the private sector,” said Prime Minister Douglas, who noted that while the recent CARICOM Heads of Government conference deferred the Justice for All Declaration to make provision for more national consultations, it did approve the mechanisms proposed by PANCAP for taking forward the agenda designed to eliminate HIV related stigma and discrimination.
“We feel confident that opening up the debates on sexual orientation, sexual and reproductive health and rights, and the abolition of laws that discriminate against homosexuals, would provide another opportunity to clarify misconceptions that erode the march toward achieving human rights. We recognise this intractable challenge of getting to Zero discrimination. It is not just a Caribbean challenge but a global challenge. Countries like Australia have shown that these challenges can be overcome by bold leadership supported by relentless activism. They cannot be swept under the carpet if ‘we are to leave no one behind’,” said Prime Minister Douglas.
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