DUSHANBE, October 7, 2010, Asia-Plus — To-date, 209 HIV/TB sufferers have been registered in Tajikistan, Tajik Deputy Health Minister, Sohibnazar Rahmonov, announced at the second Central Asian theoretical and practical conference, HIV/TB: Towards Universal Access, in Dushanbe on October 6.
On the TB situation in the country, the deputy minister stressed that the TB mortality rate has decreased and the TB growth has been suspended in the country.
“The state financing of the TB prevention activities has tripled over the past three years and eleven international institutions and donor are jointly working to improve the TB prevention activities in the country,” Rahmonov said.
He noted that the government had adopted a new national TB prevention program for 2010-2015 and it had applied to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria for US$140 million for implementation of that program.
Organized by AIDS Foundation East-West (AFEW) in cooperation with the Ministry of Health (MoH) of Tajikistan under financial support of the European Union, Central Asia AIDS Control Project (CAAP), and Open Society Institute/Assistance Foundation (OSI/AF), the conference brought together some 100 representatives from public health services, educational institutions, penitentiary departments and working groups for HIV/TB from Central Asian countries, public associations ad international organizations implementing HIV/TB prevention programs, according to the AFEW representative office in Tajikistan.
The conference participants have discussed the HIV/TB epidemiologic situation in the Central Asian region, HIV/TB prevention problems, treatment and care of patients, as well as role of NGOs in tackling problems of access to services reducing the HIV/TB co-infection risk.
The conference is concluding today. The first Central Asian conference on HIV/TB problems titled “HIV/TB: Lessons and Challenges of Dual Epidemic” took place n Kyrgyzstan in August 2009.
According to the statistical data from a MoH, 1,209 HIV sufferers have been officially registered in the country to this day and more than 1,000 new TB cases have been detected in the country since the beginning of the year.
There is growing international recognition that TB and HIV can no longer be approached as two distinct issues, but as a dual and deadly epidemic that can only be stopped by a single, integrated approach. In Central Asia, a ground-breaking coalition led by AFEW is forging progress on one of the world’s fastest growing dual epidemics.
AFEW’s HIV/TB collaborative programs are designed to improve the quality, range and reach of HIV and TB services available and to facilitate the coordination of HIV/TB activities between vertically separated and isolated healthcare structures. Likewise, AFEW’s activities seek to increase communication, co-ordination, and collaboration within the community and across the highly vertically organized and highly specialized pillars of the healthcare system. AFEW’s programs to address HIV and TB co-infection have been developed around a mixed balance of three inter-related components, including policy development awareness raising and advocacy, capacity and skills building, and direct service support for vulnerable groups.
