Malawi Govt Hailed on HIV Response, Urge to End Dependency

Malawi Govt Hailed on HIV Response, Urge to End Dependency

World Health Organisation (WHO) commends Malawi government for making remarkable progress in HIV and AIDS response in 2014 as compared to last year.

WHO country representative Dr. Eugene Nyarko said in an interview that the Malawi National Strategic Plan and adoption of new treatment from the old regimen are among the achievements.

Malawi still remains among countries that account for 89% of all new HIV infections but Dr. Nyarko hopes that Malawi can meet targets of Fast-Track strategy to end the AIDS epidemic by 2030 if current efforts are to be intensified especially on reducing current proportion of people living with HIV who do not know their HIV status against those living positively but knows HIV status who are only 34%.

He added that and reduction of new HIV infections which is currently estimated at 34,000 per year is another crucial area that Malawi has to work on.

“I think Malawi has done quite well, the National Strategic Plan that was developed is quite comprehensive and we hope that that is going to be a good foundation for us to improve further.” Said Munyarko

“We have made progress in treatment, even though we have a lot of people on treatment now we are talking of over half a million people,” he added “but compared to last year there has been remarkable progress especially in respect to those who are on treatment at the moment.”

He however said Malawi needs to explore ways of mobilizing domestic resources to end dependency on HIV treatment from donors particularly Global Fund.

“…it is up to the government together with partners supporting it to find ways of mobilizing domestic resources. It could come through taxes or other forms” he said and emphasized that this will help the government to be able to make its own contribution particularly to Antiretroviral drugs and reduce the dependency on other donors.

“What happens is, if for other reason the donors are not able to contribute then we will have virtually little to be able to sustain the drugs we need to keep people on treatment” he said

Meanwhile, Secretary for Nutrition and HIV/AIDS in the office of President and Cabinet Edith Mkawa says it may not be easy for Malawi to mobilize its own resources because local institutions that are supposed to help government on HIV have small basket to tap into.

“The challenges that we are facing now, are that we are having dwindling resources in terms of HIV and AIDS. For treatment we only have Global Fund that helps us to buy antiretroviral drugs. And there is also need for commitment from each country now that we should be able to add a certain amount of money so that we can buy drugs and other commodities within the country. She said

“And as you know with Malawi we are struggling in terms of funds and for those funds we were supposed to work with organizations like airtel (one of the mobile telecommunications) and others that would help us. But you can also relate that airtel and Carlsberg are also bombarded with requests from other people and already they provide money to other organizations and communities in so many ways”

“So we have a small resource basket as Malawi to tap into and that is one of the major challenge” said Mkawa