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West and Central Africa is the second most HIV-rich region in the world. While progress in the response to HIV has been slow, political will is in place to meet the challenges. Less than half of pregnant and badfeeding women were covered by PMTCT services in 2017. An estimated 69,000 HIV-infected adolescents aged 10 to 19 years old are infected with HIV. in 2017, less than 1% only. compared to 2010. About the same number (67,000) of estimated new HIV infections occurred in children aged 0 to 9 in 2017. In 2017, coverage for HIV treatment by children was than 26%.
Analysis
West and Central Africa are home to 6% of the world's population, but the second largest burden of HIV; this proportion is likely to increase due to the relatively high incidence of HIV among adolescents and overall fertility in several countries. The launch of treatment catch-up plans in 12 countries reflects a renewed political commitment to accelerate the response of children and HIV. The plans offer the opportunity to consider HIV testing as a major barrier to scaling up treatment in children through innovative approaches such as HIV diagnosis at the place of treatment, HIV testing in the family, and the integration of the dual HIV / syphilis test.
In 2017 alone, Nigeria accounted for half of all children and adolescents living with HIV in the region, while four other countries – the Democratic Republic of Congo, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana – accounted for 30 % of the total population. total. The highly variable impact from one country to another underscores the need for a differentiated response to improve regional PMTCT programming and other responses in prevention and prevention. treatment of HIV in children and adolescents.
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