A Consultant Medical Microbiologist and the Anti Retroviral Therapy Coordinator, at the Dalhatu Araf Specialist Hospital, Lafiya, Dr. Esther Solomon Audu, has blamed loss of HIV cases in Nigeria on insecurity and migration.
She was speaking to health editors in Lafiya, Nasarawa state, north central Nigeria during a media tour of HIV facilities with the National Agency for the Control of Aids.
She explained that in Nasarawa state in particular, there are communities bothering Benue state where there are communal crisis which causes unplanned relocation and loss of patients.
“For some, missing their appointment is not actually their fault. There places that have communal crisis. And then you find that the time they are supposed to come to the hospital, there’s a problem in their community and they are not able to come. Those communal crisis contribute to parents being lost to follow up.” Dr. Audu said.
She said that most people willingly go for HIV tests and have the plans to start treatment but insecurity in their house laces makes them relocate and go further from treatment centres.
“We have patients coming for testing and being lost after that. There are times that patients will come in, from the point of testing, you’ll want to document them, they’ll tell you let me go and inform my husband or wife. When you check, you find out, they did not enroll for care. There are a few patients like that. But we have people stationed to make sure that people don’t get lost after testing. We try to limit that as much as possible. But, no matter how you put measures in place, some people are just crafty, because as soon as they hear that they are HIV positive, they find a way of disappearing and not come back for care”. Dr. Audu said.
She noted that a lot of counseling is needed to disabuse the minds of HIV patients. She also advice patients to register in care centres closer to them yi be able to receive adequate treatment.
” We have also the problem of patients coming from long distances because they don’t want to access care where they are because people know them there and because of stigma. So when they go to a far distance they begin to have problems of transportation. Initially, they might say they can actually hold to Akwanga from Lafiya but when they collect once or twice, before long, they begin to default and miss their treatments and so they don’t do well with their drugs”. She said.
She added that the Dalhatu Araf Specialist Hospital, Lafiya which offers a comprehensive HIV services has recorded successes in counseling and care.
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