Abuja — Findings in a new survey
carried out by experts on HIV/AIDS
have identified about 3,500 male sex
workers within Abuja metropolis, a
situation that has raised concern
about the danger of homosexual
activities to the fight against HIV/AIDS
in the country. The revelation came
amid the anti-homosexual legislation
signed into law by former President
Goodluck Jonathan. Chairman of
NACA maiden lecture, Dr. Patrick
Dakum made this known on Friday
as a prelude to this year's World AIDS
Day in Abuja. On the survey, Dakum
explained that stakeholders were
worried by this figures because over
60 per cent of the men were married,
raising the concern of spouse HIV
transmission. The lecture which had
as its theme, 'Strategies for Ending
AIDS by 2030' harped on the need to
adopt practical measures in order to
bring new infections to zero.
NACA DG, Prof. John Idoko stated
that with the new focus on AIDS in
Nigeria pushing towards complete
eradication by 2030, the agency was
now targeting hotspot areas in its
drive to end the HIV epidemic.
"Within the Federal Capital Territory,
we found that if we focus our
resources in three council areas of
Gwagwalada, Bwari and Abuja
Municipal, we would have covered a
greater population of persons with
HIV within the area," NACA DG
observed. Idoko explained that the
agency was developing interventions
to be able to reduce contact between
infected and uninfected persons.
Delivering his lecture, Director of
Global Health at the University of
Manitoba, Canada, Professor James
Blanchard, said notwithstanding
modern technologies, HIV prevention
was a very complex thing because
there were social factors that need to
be addressed like political
commitment and advocacy, laws and
labour policies, community
mobilisation and a host of other
things. Blanchard stated that
Nigerian was a very large and
complex country, extending services
to those who needed to receive the
treatment required that the country
concentrate on the right environment
and high risk areas. "We need to
match our HIV interventions with the
population of HIV distribution. We
need to get down to the micro level to
know where we put our resources.
We have the sex workers, persons
who inject drugs and men who have
sex with men," he said. He stated that NACA survey had identified eight priority states in Nigeria because HIV was not evenly distributed, adding that there were very large population in parts of FCT, Lagos, Nasarawa and Benue.
He said "We found that in Benue, 60
per cent of men who visited bars,
restaurants and hotels were seeking
sexual partners while 12 per cent of
the females were seeking sexual
partners and nine per cent of those
who patronise these places are
female sex workers. "We also saw
substantial risk behaviour in rural
areas. In Benue, 30 per cent of the
unmarried men had visited a worker
and 18 per cent had visited sex
workers within the last one month.
But this was not the same across the
state as some places were high risk
areas." Also, a high proportion of
married women in the NACA study
reported having more than one
sexual partner in Cross River and
Benue within the last six months.
"We need to recognise that Nigeria is
a high mixed epidemic with a large
number of female sex workers and
high causal and female sex workers
in urban areas," Blanchard said.
According to him, Nigeria needed to
think of how it could cover its key
population particularly the sex
workers through intensified
outreaches, condom programming,
intensifying treatment and testing
programme. "We need to think of
structural programmes to reduce
stigma, to reduce vulnerability and
violence for sex workers. We should
focus our interventions in urban
hotspot rather than thinking of a
general flood irrigation approach,"
Blanchard stressed. Also Speaking,
the Catholic Bishop of Abuja
Metropolitan See, John Cardinal
Onaiyekan said the church would
continue to support the fight against
HIV/AIDS, adding that, there was
need to explore all the avenues of
preventing the spread of the virus
rather than focusing too much on use
of condoms.
Onaiyekan contended that with new
advancement in treatment, persons
living with the virus could live a more
favourable life without resorting to
spreading the disease. UNAIDS
Country Director to Nigeria, Dr. Bilali
Camara told the gathering that "the
HIV prevalence is unequal among
young males and females 15-24 year-
olds; for age groups 25-29 to 30-34,
females have a higher prevalence.
The prevalence for males then peaks
in age group 35-39 and remains
higher for the age group 40-44.
Camara added that "this underlines
the high burden of HIV among
women and especially young women
in Nigeria. This observation puts
women, especially young women at
the centre of the HIV/AIDS response."http://allafrica.com/stories/201511303100.html

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