PESHAWAR: Health department has established seven more HIV screening, diagnostic and treatment centres to strengthen surveillance and test more vulnerable people in the province.

The project director of HIV Programme, Dr Tariq Hayat, told Dawn that the province had recorded a total of 6,966 HIV/Aids patients since 2005. “We have detected 898 HIV patients of the total 17,600 tests this year so far. The number of positive cases was 1,025 in 2022. Of the total infected people, 1,226 have died so far,” he added.

He said that an estimated 416 infected people belonged to the same family including husbands, wives and children. He said that efforts were intensified to reach suspected patients to enhance free screening, diagnosis, counselling and treatment.

A centre at Hayatabad Medical Complex was established in 2005 and five more, including one each in Lady Reading Hospital, Peshawar Kohat, Bannu, Dera Ismail Khan and Batkhela, started operations in 2017. The new centres were established in Swat, Swabi, Mardan, Abbottabad, Parachinar, Miranshah and Bajaur this year due to which the number of tests increased by 20 per cent.

Official says the province has detected 898 Aids patients this year

Dr Tariq said that 39 per cent of the infected people contracted the disease due to unsafe sex, 11 per cent were injection drug users (IDUs) and seven per cent received unscreened blood. The causes of the disease in the remaining patients were unknown, he added.

“In majority cases, patients don’t disclose the reason and we cannot force them in view of the guidelines,” he said. He said that 64 per cent of the patents were men, 28 per cent were women, six per cent were children and two per cent were transgender persons. He added that five per cent of the patients were those people, who were deported from different countries.

“Most of under-treatment patients face difficulties for follow-up visits to the already existing six centres. Therefore, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has helped us to set up new centres on the request of Health Secretary Mahmood Aslam Wazir and Director General Health Dr Shaukat Ali to ensure that the patients receive facilities at divisional level throughout the province,” said Dr Tariq.

He said that people used to travel long way to get treated after every three months and in most of the cases they would miss the treatment time due to travel and financial issues.

“The travel costs will now reduce significantly. Every centre regularly follows up its registered patients on quarterly basis to conduct their viral load test free through Agha Khan Labs Karachi and enable them take their medicines in timely manner as HIV requires lifelong treatment,” he added.

The programme manager said that very few people were coming on their own for HIV screening until signs and symptoms appeared or they were referred by a doctor. Otherwise, people were not visiting the centres due to social taboos associated with the ailment, he added.

He said that Pakistan had so far registered 54,000 people having HIV and getting treatment. He said that as per surveys conducted by World Health Organisation and other groups, the country had an estimated 250,000 to 270,000 positive cases. “Therefore, we are trying to increase tests to ascertain the actual number of patients in the province,” he added.

Of the confirmed cases in Pakistan, 51 per cent are from Punjab, 32 per cent from Sindh, 13 per cent from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and four per cent from Baluchistan.

Dr Tariq said that alongside diagnosis and treatment, the centres were also playing vital role in scaling up public awareness to safeguard people from being infected with HIV/Aids.

The social taboo associated with the disease prevented patients from undergoing testing as most people thought it was sex-borne disease, which was not correct in its entirety, he said.

“People should pursue safe sex practices, insist on using new syringes when visit clinics and hospitals, avoid tattooing and shaving at barber shops and get screened blood,” said Dr Tariq.

Published in Dawn, December 9th, 2023