Global Fund pumps $160m into HIV battle
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Myanmar has received US$160 million (about Bt5 billion) from the Global Fund, to combat HIV/Aids through to 2016, according to the Health Planning Department under the Ministry of Health.
The Global Fund has been the main financier of HIV/Aids treatment in Myanmar, with other foreign organisations cooperating with local counterparts to combat the disease through projects within the country.
Statistics from the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/Aids (UNAIDS) show that the HIV/Aids infection rate in Myanmar dropped from 0.67 per cent in 2007 to 0.53 per cent in 2012.
There are an estimated 200,000 people living with HIV in Myanmar and the country has the third-highest HIV prevalence in the Asia-Pacific region at 0.47 per cent, according to UNAIDS.
As part of the country’s National Strategic Plan, Myanmar has been cooperating with local and international NGOs to provide antiretroviral treatment for over 53,000 patients.
Last year, the country provided antiretrovirals to 43 per cent of its 120,000 HIV/Aids patients and expects to cover 85 per cent of patients by 2016.
Since 2005, antiretroviral treatment departments have been opened at Waibargi Hospital in Yangon, Mandalay General Hospital and four hospitals on the Myanmar-Thai border.
Last year, antiretroviral departments were operating in 48 public hospitals across Myanmar.
The new fund for Aids response is part of a $315-million grant by the Global Fund to combat HIV, tuberculosis and malaria in Myanmar.
