Minister of Health, Dr George Norton in his presentation at the UNAIDS 37th Programme Coor-dinating Board meeting last month in Geneva, Switzerland said not enough has been done to address HIV in prisons.
According to a Government Information Agency (GINA) press release, Norton, Guyana’s representative at the meeting told those gathered, the issue has to be tackled at all levels including at the policy stage.
“I wish to state in advance that I am in full support of accelerating an increased access to HIV prevention, treatment and care services for people in prisons and other closed settings. Whilst we are all aware of the risk for HIV in prisons and closed settings, our response in many ways have been lagging and therefore the time is opportune that we prioritise this population.
“At the national level there has to be willingness and openness of all stakeholders to collaborate and share information as (much as) possible. There has to be leadership from line ministries,” Norton said.
In addition to which, policies have to take on board a comprehensive, combination prevention approach to HIV, the minister noted, and the opponents of prevention services particularly condoms in prison must be educated and lobbied to ensure that there is full understanding of the issues and that decisions are based on evidence and science.
The handing out of condoms in prisons has been a touchy issue particularly because sexual intercourse between men remains criminalised.
Guyana has been doing well in HIV prevention and treatment in some regards, the minister said, however, he noted that the prison population has an HIV prevalence of at least two times higher than that of the general population.
Several factors contributing to the high HIV rates in the prison population, Norton said, are the lack of knowledge and discontinuation of Anti Retroviral Treatment (ARV). “Some of the persons who started on the ARV treatment in the prison setting are far too often lost to follow up. This gap is significant and the implications are far reaching.” Norton said.
On the contrary, Norton said, “TB programmes in many cases have done well in prison settings … this is a real opportunity for us to all take comparative advantage of established TB programmes in creating synergies and better efficiency in dealing with the HIV epidemic.”
