DOH unveils measures to prevent HIV spread

CEBU, Philippines — Amid the rising cases of Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) in the country, the Department of Health (DOH) offers measures that would prevent people from acquiring the infectious disease.

HIV Technical Working Group head Rossana Ditangco enumerates at least five of the many ways that HIV can be prevented and stop from further spreading.

“You have education as the first and foremost important thing in making everyone aware of HIV followed by HIV counseling and testing, then the use of condoms and lubes to prevent unprotected sex, the needle and syringe program, and the use of antiretroviral (ARV) drugs,” Ditangco said.

World Health Organization (WHO) country representative Leila Coppens also enumerated four ways from the so-called 90-90-90 treatment target that aims to help reduce the spread of the sexually-transmitted disease.

"The first step is prevention which can be done through social media and protection. The second would be to get yourself tested. The third is to get treated and finally to suppress the virus blowout," said Coppens during the 2017 HIV Convention and Treatment Hub Conference held yesterday in Cebu City.

This 90-90-90 treatment target contains three goals that WHO and United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) aims to achieve by 2020: 90 percent of all people living with HIV will know their HIV status, 90 percent of all people with diagnosed, HIV infection will receive sustained antiretroviral therapy and 90 percent of all people receiving antiretroviral therapy will have viral suppression.

Of the 45,023 total HIV cases recorded nationwide since 1984, Central Visayas has 4,066. Male-to-male sex remains to be the number one cause of HIV among the youth, accumulating at least 18,495 from January 2012 to June 2017.

With this year’s theme “Unity Towards One Positive Action,” government hospitals and the various local government units (LGUs) are empowered to collaborate to continually suppress the HIV epidemic.

“New cases are documented as early as 16 years old in the country. It is important to highlight achievements such as prevention, treatment and cure. We have close to 150 centers countering HIV nationwide,” said DOH-7 Director Jaime Bernadas.

Bernadas added that Cebu City is one of the nine areas in the country with social hygiene clinics that has been doing HIV Diagnostic Testing Algorithm rapidly.Aside from the social hygiene clinics around Cebu, Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center (VSMMC) is so far the only government hospital in Cebu that serves as the treatment hub for HIV-positive patients.

In 2016, there were 100 patients that were linked to care with VSMMC with only 66 of them being diagnosed.

As of June 2017, there were 1,897 people from VSMMC that were treated with ARV, while 95 patients out of 119 were virally suppressed for viral load.

ARV drugs do not kill or cure the virus but they can prevent the growth of the virus, which then slows down the HIV disease.

PhilHealth also offers the Outpatient HIV/AIDS Treatment (OHAT) Package up to P30,000 per year that is accessible to patients. The package covers medicines, laboratories, and the doctor’s professional fee.

“The current OHAT package is enough to cover the treatment expenditures of patients for the first wave of drugs, but not enough for the 2nd wave of more expensive drugs for opportunistic infections,’ said Dr. Israel Pargas, PhilHealth spokesperson.

DOH-7 Program Manager of the National AIDS and STD Prevention and Control Program (NASPCP) Jose Belimac underscored the budget increase from P600 million in 2016 to P900 million this year to address the HIV epidemic. (FREEMAN)