Slight increase in HIV prevalence
Maranyane Ngwanaamotho | Friday May 9, 2014 15:15
Annah Majelantle from Statistics Botswana told a national AIDS council meeting yesterday that the HIV/AIDS prevalence rate has increased from 17.5 percent in 2008 to 18.5 percent last year.
The results were from a sampled population of 213, 518 people aged 18 months old and above in the country. Majelantle said the findings mean efforts to keep or save people living with HIV/AIDS are bearing fruit.
This is because more people are now living with the virus for a longer period, lowering mortality rates. Prevalence is the number of total cases of HIV in a population at a certain moment in time, she explained.
The 2013 HIV prevalence by district ranged from 11.1 percent in Kgalagadi South to 27.5 percent in Selebi-Phikwe. Second to Selebi-Phikwe is Mahalapye Sub-District.
The prevalence rate has dropped from 25.4 percent to 19.8 percent in Sowa Town, while Kgalagadi North has recorded a sharp increase from 11.8 percent to 18.1 percent. All the changes could not be explained. It is suspected that migration and mortality could be contributing factors to prevalence rates increasing and decreasing in some areas.
It is not clear why Kgalagadi South has one of the lowest prevalence rates while Kgalagadi North realised a sharp increase in a space of four years.
Chobe, Ngamiland West and Kweneng West recorded the lowest prevalence rates in the country. The prevalence was highest in the 31-49 age group at 40.6 percent.
By gender, females had a relatively higher prevalence rate, which stood at 20.8 percent compared to the males at 15.6 percent. There has been a slight increase for both from the 2008 study where the rate was 14.2 percent for men and 20.4 percent for women.
Women aged 35-39 had the highest prevalence rate (50 percent) while men’s figures were higher in the other age groups. It was explained that the change could be as a result of older men engaging in sexual activities with younger women.
By age, the prevalence was highest at 43.7 percent in the 35-39 bracket for both sexes. The prevalence rate was 2.2 percent for less than 18-month-old babies (PMTCT babies) and 1.2 percent for the 18 months to four years group. On education category, HIV prevalence was high among respondents with non-formal education (20.6 percent) while it declined steeply with increasing levels of education beyond secondary school.
Separated women have a higher prevalence rate (51.2 percent) compared to 14.9 percent for separated men. Gender imbalances, poverty and disempowerment were mentioned as some of the contributing factors to the prevalence rates.
Majelantle said that there has been an increase in the number of adults aged 15-49 engaging in multi concurrent relationships.
However, condom use in multi concurrent relationships was at 81.9 percent, which is described as a breakthrough. In the 15-24 age group, condom use stood at 91.4 percent.
The number of people in the 10-64 age group who tested for HIV at least is 70.2 percent compared to only 56 percent who tested in 2008. More people are willing to find out their test results in the latest survey compared to 2008.
Meanwhile, the Minister of Health, Dr John Seakgosing has said he is impressed with progress in the fight against HIV/AIDS. He is happy with the number of Batswana who were now willing to test and know their HIV status. He said this could lead to more people enrolling for ARV treatment.
“This is rewarding indeed. This shows that our efforts were not for nothing. PMTCT is one of the very successful programmes, and it has paid off. This shows that we are not losing the battle,” he said.
He is still worried about the high HIV prevalence among women. “We cannot blame activities like sex work anymore because women engage in the sex work with men, but HIV prevalence has persistently remained high among women and we need to probe this further,” he said.