HIV Issues Should be Part of Country's Development Plans

This is the opinion of participants at the two-day advocacy meeting between the National AIDS Secretariat and members of the National Assembly.

 

The meeting supported by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in The Gambia was held at the Jerma Beach Hotel, Kololi.

 

Speaking at the forum, Mr. Alieu Jammeh, director general of the National AIDS Secretariat noted that the impact of HIV/AIDS is unique because AIDS kills adults in the prime of their lives, thus depriving families, communities, and entire nations of their young and most productive population.

 

According to him, the people who are most affected are the breadwinners and caretakers, resulting into income loss, agriculture output declines, worsened nutrition, increase in spending on health care, as well as a general decline in the educational and health status of the people. He said the situation thus shows that poverty, gender and HIV/AIDS seem to be closely intertwined.

 

This is why, he stressed, it is important that poverty reduction strategies which are the main development planning instruments in many countries, determining national priorities and domestic as well as external resource allocation, should have a special focus for the fight against HIV/AIDS.

 

He said mainstreaming HIV-related priorities into poverty reduction strategies helps create an 'enabling policy and resource environment' for an effective response to the epidemic, thus achieving synergy between diverse interventions across many sectors, and ensuring adequate financing for HIV/AIDS. 

 

He said people in government, especially lawmakers, have roles to play in the fight against HIV. This they could do by enacting legislation to protect the rights of those affected; overseeing the proper implementation of the programmes; supervising the proper allocation of resources to national HIV/AIDS programmes, as well as advocating against the stigma of HIV/AIDS and promoting greater awareness of the disease.

 

According to him, there has been a low level of involvement of legislatures in contributing to the response to the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Africa, noting that this is weakening parliamentary participation in HIV issues.

 

He said the executive arm of The Gambia government has provided strong leadership in the fight against the scourge and the legislators should now weigh in to consolidate these good-intentioned efforts of the government.

 

“There is a marked failure by HIV/AIDS stakeholders in general to sensitize legislators on the important inter-linkages between their constitutional and legal obligation on one side and the political, economic and social state of their constituencies on the other. Parliamentarians also lack training on the complexities of HIV and AIDS and policy implications which go well beyond developing stronger health programmes,” Mr. Jammeh noted.

 

He then said that sensitizing NAMs would also ensure that multi-sectoral strategies and financial plans address the epidemic effectively and efficiently; strengthen and/or develop legislation, regulation and other measures to eliminate all forms of discrimination against people living with HIV/AIDS and members of vulnerable groups such as orphaned vulnerable children.

 

He said their participation would also “create and ensure a supportive environment for local and national organizations to expand and strengthen partnerships, coalitions and networks in fighting HIV/AIDS.”

 

Such functions of parliamentarians would help foster an environment conducive for an effective routing of the epidemic.

 

For his part, Mr. Nuha Ceesay, UNAIDS country representative said the AIDS epidemic continues to pose serious challenges in the region with increasing trends and diverse inter and intra country prevalence ranging from 1 percent to 13 percent respectively as well as the existence of both HIV1 and HIV2 epidemic. According to him, there are systematic issues such as inadequate human capacity and institutional structures, weak health systems and the sheer lack of coordination and harmonization of efforts.

 

“The challenges are very huge now than ever before because of the global financial, fuel and food crisis. There are also other competing priorities such as climate change resulting in stretching the limited financial resources and development assistance,” he said, noting that despite all these daunting challenges, a lot have been invested in the global, regional and national response to HIV.

 

He then called for support from the parliamentarians so that the fight against HIV/AIDS could be more focused, concerted and severe.

 

Also speaking, Mr. Abdou Touray, director general of the National Planning Commission (NPC) said HIV/AIDS is identified as one among many competing and interrelated public health challenges that need to be addressed in all national development instruments and thus warranting its treatment as one of the crosscutting issues in the PRSP.

 

He said that in spite of the numerous public actions and remarkable gains, HIV/AIDS still remains a national challenge to all development efforts and the country has no option but to give it the much attention it deserves. 

 

Hon. Adama Cham, who represented the Speaker of the National Assembly, Madam Elizabeth Renner also noted that the inputs of the parliamentarians are needed in ensuring a concerted fight against HIV/AIDS.