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#Breaking #chain #Political #Economy
n Silent corners of hospitals, neglected rural clinics and the margins of our cities, the silent epidemic begins. It not only suffers from a virus, but also of ignorance, notoriety and systemic failure. HIV/ AIDS, once associated with remote lands and foreign headlines, are now making their presence deep in the fabric of Pakistan’s health crisis. Many people’s IT, this is an unclear tragedy, the prohibition is involved in the shroud and the bureaucracy. Silence, a liar life – fracture, forgotten and fight. Since the world is close to the innovations of scientific progress and policies to prevent this disease, Pakistan tamper with the destruction of a prevention. The virus is not just a test of our medical infrastructure. It is a latime test of our sympathy, our political priorities and our social maturity.
Prevention cannot be reduced to a clinical checklist. Its concept must be considered moral, structural and culturally – a chain should be broken not only with syringes and slogans, but also with courage, explanation and collective will.
After more than four decades of HIV/ AIDS appearance, the virus has become an important global health challenge. According to the World Health Organization, about 39 39.9 million people were living with HIV at the end of 2023. This year, 1.3 million new infections and 630,000 AIDS deaths were recorded. Although progress in medical treatment, such as antibacterial therapy (ART) and pre -exposed prophylaxis (PEP), has converted HIV to a deadly disease from a deadly disease, but the real war is to prevent it. This fight often hinder notoriety, misconduct and policy weaknesses.
Pakistan, which once promises less, is now witnessing an increase in HIV affairs. The National AIDS Control Program estimates that more than 240,000 people are living with HIV in Pakistan. Only one of them is enrolled for treatment. Despite international support and a established framework, Pakistan pays the risk of a common outbreak unless it is preferred to prevent sincerity, strategy and social engagement. In districts like Larqana, Gujarat, and Faisalabad, the imitation of infection indicates a shortage of concern in dealing with the risk of systemic neglect and pandemic diseases. This is not just health failure – it is a reflection of a vast institutional and social piece.
Globally, HIV prevention is developed by a combination of medical, behavior and structural interference. Early ABC strategy – instability, loyalty, and condom use – is insufficient. The rise of the Prep, the post -exhibition prophylaxis (PEP), the loss strategy for users of diarrhea, preventing the transfer of child to child, and community -based educational programs have significantly reduced new infections in many countries. For example, Sub Saharan Africa has gained 70 % reduction in the new HIV infection since 1993. This has led to better awareness, increased access to art and increased locally -run HIV programs. This deficiency makes it clear that even when the public health is kept beyond political speed and cultural prohibition, even the cemetery crises can be controlled. Unfortunately, Pakistan has not yet made a copy of such a commitment.
Pakistan’s HIV crisis is not just medical. It is deep social, political and moral. The spread of areas like Ratodero in Sindh shows how structural risks – such as unworthy blood transfer and unsafe injection methods by disqualified practitioners. 895 certified cases, resulting in the outbreak of 2019, 754 of them, mainly due to the reuse of syringes. Key populations, including drug users (IDUS), transgender individuals, sex workers and men who have sex with men (MSM), are at the center of the epidemic. Criminals, moral policing, and state apathy have hidden these groups in national policy conversations. The dislike of policy makers to resolve these facts has promoted a dangerous culture of denial – where the virus is allowed to spread quietly through social error lines.
The root root of the prevention should not be recognized in policies and pills, but rather sympathy, dignity and the right of every citizen’s right to health.
Several factors support the failure of HIV prevention efforts in Pakistan. First, especially in rural areas, lack of comprehensive surveillance and testing. Volunteer consultation and testing centers are limited and often inaccessible. Second, the loss programs for the IDUS, such as the needle exchange program and the treatment of opium replacement, are limited and less funded. Third, despite the rules of blood screening, unorganized blood banks and illegal transfer centers continue to operate. Fourth, public conversation around sex is forbidden, and comprehensive sex education is absent from the curriculum. This allows fiction to form a public understanding. Fifth, only 25 % of the HIV diagnostics are on art, with the irregular supply and notoriety of drugs. The sixth, social dishonor leads to the disgrace of people living with HIV, discouraged tests and pushes outbreaks.
These failures have been complicated due to institutional and wrong policy priorities. A state that census the reproductive precision conversation, can potentially deal with the outbreak involved in sex and drug transmission. It is contradictory that when Pakistan has signed international conventions on the right to health, its domestic policies often conflict with these principles. The absence of accountability and performance -based diagnosis in the rule of health enables bureaucratic happiness. Awareness campaigns are reduced to checkbox exercises and access to treatment is best complicated. In addition, donor dependence has hollowed out the national ownership of HIV response programs. It eliminates long -term stability in question.
A comprehensive framework of prevention for Pakistan must go beyond interference. It calls for a multi -faceted, integrated and rights -based approach. Political commitment is essential. Governments need to permanently fund HIV programs, update the legal framework and connect HIV’s response to ministries. For key populations, targeted intervention should be ensured free tests, condoms, pre -and -consulting without fear of harassing or arresting. Religious leaders, local health workers and the media have to be included in community -based educational campaigns to remove myths. The health care regulation should be eliminated and promoted safe medical methods.
The engagement of youth is essential through curriculum reform. It has to include appropriate, scientifically accurate information about HIV and reproductive health. Global access to testing and treatment should be normalized as part of a normal health examination, which has decentralized art distribution and stable supply chain. Investing in real -time data collecting and epidemic research is essential to maintain an effective strategy to understand and prevent developing trends.
Beyond all technical measures, real change in culture is essential. The prevention of HIV in Pakistan will not succeed unless it is unstable and unstable. Civil society, religious institutions and local influence will have to cooperate to renovate the story around HIV – which describes fear as shameful and embarrassing. Instead of developing HIV as a sign of moral failure, it should be viewed through the lens of structural injustice and health inequality.
Making epidemic is very important. There is a person behind each figure. A mother is unable to breastfeed her baby. A young HIV contract with unsafe medical procedures. A transgender person refused treatment. The roots of prevention should not only be folded into policies and pills, but also recognize the right to sympathy, dignity and the right of every citizen’s health. The social flexibility against the disease is not fully on the development of pharmaceuticals, but mostly on the moral backbone of a society that values every human life.
The author is a researcher based in Islamabad. It can be arrived at zakiir9669@gmail.com
