SUCCESS OF a World Health Organisation (WHO) recommendation that people diagnosed with HIV be put on antiretroviral therapy immediately will be determined by costs and human resources.
This is the position of Senior Medical Officer Dr Anton Best who said starting early treatment could assist Barbados in reaching the UNAIDS Fast-Track Programme goal of zero new transmissions by 2030.
“At the end of September WHO came out with a recommendation that everybody needs to be on therapy. That is the direction that Barbados needs to go,” said Best.
He explained that when the Ministry of Health started anti-retroviral treatment (ART) in 2002, the criterion was that individuals had to have a CD4 (white blood cell) count of 200 the stage they were considered to have AIDS. (LK)
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