HIV Survey Gets Support From US, To Last Six Months

Posted By Adoga Michael Oyi


The United States government has donated a sum of $90 million to support the HIV survey to be conducted in Nigeria. This was disclosed by the Minister of Health, Isaac Adewole, at the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on the survey in Abuja on Thursday.
The agreement was signed by the minister, the United States Ambassador to Nigeria, Stuart Symington, and the National Agency for the Control of Aids (NACA).
The survey,which is tagged Nigeria Aids Indicators and Impact Survey (NAIIS), is the largest in the world and Nigeria is the 12th country embarking on such.
It is expected to last a period of six months, starting from June and to be conducted across the 36 states and Federal Capital Territory (FCT), with the aim to reach a sample size of about 170,000 people.
According to Adewole, “The resources for the survey is largely from the US government. Directly they are giving us about $90million and indirectly they are working with other partners to ensure the success of the survey.”
“The survey will put behind us the concept of making guess work in terms of burden of HIV disease in Nigeria. We do not know how many people are infected, so this study will enable us get a precise number.”
“This survey is not only about HIV, but about Hepatitis B and C. This survey will also help us to drive forward the agenda to cure Nigeria of Hepatitis C. As you know, Hepatitis C now has a cure.”
“Also, people who test positive will be placed on treatment, as having HIV is not the end of the world,” he stated.
The health minister further called that politics be not mixed with the survey. He said, “For us as a country, we owe it a duty as a government to make sure that it works and to ensure that politics is excluded from the entire work.”
“It is mainly a scientific process and we will publish the data as it is. It will be totally free of politics and free of government interference so we can discover the real state of HIV in the country. It will serve as a drive to our effort to control the epidemic.”
In remark, the U.S. Ambassador to Nigeria, Stuart Symington, called on Nigerians to contribute their resources and time to the survey in order to ensure its success.
He stated that the survey will serve as a model to the rest of the world, and will help put the HIV epidemic under control.
Symington said, “It is the joy of everybody in the United States to make Nigerians healthy. This survey, this partnership, this opportunity will set an example for Nigeria and to the whole world.”
“This is in the power of every Nigerian to participate in the survey. In the world today, people are trying to do what no human being have ever done before and that is to bring to a close a terrible disease without a proven cure and the remedy here is us.”
“An epidemic control has not yet been achieved anywhere, but with this effort the government of Nigeria in partnership with this extraordinary team of partners funded by every man, woman and child in the United States of America, a huge success will be achieved, as one thing everyone can do this year, is to help make this survey a success,” he stated.