"A re nyalaneng (let's get married in order to prevent HIV)," she emphasised.
Tlou was one of the delegates who addressed media practitioners on leadership's impact on the fight against HIV/AIDS in Botswana at the SAIMED conference centre.
Tlou noted that the uptake of prevention of mother to child transmission (PMTCT) has increased from 49 percent in 2002 to 83 percent this year. She said that prevalence rates for pregnant women were reducing, and that the PMTCT uptake for women in the rural areas was almost at 100 percent.
Explaining the difference in uptake in urban and rural areas, she said in towns, people have 'rights' to test and enroll into programmes. She deduced that some might be shying away from antenatal care.
She said reduction of mother to child transmission has been reduced from about 40 percent in 2000 to 3.5 percent in 2007. "It could never be zero but we are better than many including developed countries," the minister said.
