The Health Ministry today launched the Antiretroviral (ARV) care and treatment guideline and Prevention of Parent to Child (PPTCT) policy for people living with HIV (PLHIV).
This set of guidelines acts as a manual for health workers at divisional hospitals and sub-divisional health centers to provide care for PLHIV and proper use of ARV drugs.
The health care workers are expected to provide HIV counseling and testing services in the health care facilities to PLHIV. The guideline will also serve to train health care workers on proper drug regimen, monitoring and therapy services.
The Minister for Health, Dr Neil Sharma said the policy aims to provide access to services for all pregnant women such as HIV screening , pre and post-test counseling and counseling on infant feeding.
“To date, 98 percent of pregnant women counselled have been offered to take the HIV screenings. Since May 2012, all HIV positive pregnant women are offered Antiretroviral Therapy for life to protect mothers’ health and prevent infection to the infant. The need for prevention of transmission of HIV from parents to child is paramount for the ministry to achieve its targets of Zero new HIV infections,” Dr Sharma said.
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