News

The 22nd International AIDS Conference that will take place in Amsterdam, the Netherlands on 23-27 July, 2018, announces its scientific tracks and conference objectives. The registration for the conference opens on December 1, 2017. More information about abstracts and submissions will be available in the coming months.

Hepatitis Prevention Month to commemorate the World Hepatitis Day was organised for the first time in the history of Kyrgyzstan by the Ministry of Health in July this year. Over the recent years, the list of registered and allowed for import medications to treat hepatitis C has been expanded, the new clinical treatment protocol has been approved and a six-year target program to counteract viral hepatitis was adopted. In our interview with Nurgul Ibraeva, Chief Officer of the Department of Health Services and Medications Policy of the Kyrgyz Ministry of Health, we discussed the reasons for the increased attention to the problem of hepatitis in Kyrgyzstan.

“Kyianka+” group, operating with support from ICF “AIDS Foundation East-West” (AFEW-Ukraine), was created three years ago, and has already helped more than 150 women. Women living with HIV attend monthly meetings, participate in master classes and get psychological counselling. Members of self-help group conduct regular meetings to exchange positive emotions, share success stories and learn how to resist psychological abuse.

Success with harm reduction has recently been achieved in Tajikistan. HIV epidemic amongst injecting drug users also seems to stabilize and even decline. Unfortunately, HIV is still increasing as now it also enters wider community around people who use drugs (PUD) and other key populations. Sexual transmission of HIV is rising, and women is the most vulnerable group in this new wave of HIV infections. Besides, in Tajikistan there are other health related issues with tuberculosis, hepatitis and sexual and reproductive health. These are the observations of AFEW International’s director of the programs Janine Wildschut who visited Tajikistan last week to monitor the work of ‘Bridging the Gaps: health and rights for key popualtions’ programme.

The world movement, which already includes more than 70 major cities around the world, has reached Central Asia. The first city, whose authorities signed Paris Declaration with an appeal to stop AIDS epidemic on July 20, 2017, was Almaty.

Georgia has inadequate policies in the area of sexual and reproductive health and rights. There are strong religious and conservative powers and gender inequality in addition to a fragile civil society that especially influences the lives of adolescents and young people. Much progress has been made in recent years in advocacy to advance youth sexual and reproductive health and rights, for example.