The Sunday Mail
Tadiwa Nyatanga-Pfupa
The National AIDS Council’s Harare Metropolitan Province recently commemorated its Provincial World AIDS Day at Chitungwiza Town Centre.
The function was held under the 2018/9 World AIDS Campaign Know Your Status, with a pay off line that says ‘My Status. My Health. My Life.’
The Ministry of Health and Child Care and the National AIDS Council broadened the theme further by encouraging people to know not just their HIV status but also their TB, STI, cancer and other non-communicable diseases status.
Hundreds of people from the province and surrounding areas, Government officials, partners in the response to HIV and religious leaders attended the occasion.
Guest of honour, Minister of Provincial Affairs for Harare Province, Honourable Engineer Oliver Chidhawu, underscored on the need for eradication of stigma in mindsets, families and communities.
He highlighted that some people, due to fear or stigma, are still avoiding HIV testing. As a result, they fail to access antiretroviral therapy.
“I want to appeal to NAC and its partners to strengthen programmes focusing on people’s attitudes and building accepting attitudes towards people living with HIV as a building block towards everyone knowing and appreciating their status in line with the campaign’s pay off line,” he said.
Honourable Chidhawu also encouraged women to get screened for cancer as early detection save lives.
He also encouraged everyone to get tested for HIV. Hon Chidhawu implored expecting mothers to present themselves for HIV testing within 12 weeks of pregnancy to prevent passing on the virus to the unborn children.
“We need to vigorously promote HIV testing, particularly among pregnant women, youths, adolescent girls and young women, sex workers and other hard to reach key populations,” he said.
He also mentioned that ending child marriages is a way of protecting girls from HIV and cervical cancer.
The Honourable Minister called for the scaling up of trending innovations such as Index Case Tracing and HIV self-testing in the response to HIV.
These, he said, should be complimented by high impact HIV prevention services such as promotion and distribution of both male and female condoms, voluntary medical male circumcision and prevention of mother to child transmission of HIV.
The World AIDS Day is commemorated annually on 1 December.
World AIDS Day 2018 for Zimbabwe was held in Mazowe on 1 December, 2018, where the First Lady Amai Auxillia Mnangagwa was guest of honour.
Provinces have been holding their commemorations in the past months to keep the momentum of the campaign alive.
