Malaysia hope to achieve zero-HIV/AIDS nation status by 2030: Subramaniam

KUCHING: The Health Ministry hopes to achieve the target of zero-HIV/AIDS nation by year 2030.
Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr S. Subramaniam said the zero-HIV/AIDS nation by 2030 target was also the same target for the world.
“Whether the world achieves the target or not we (Malaysia) are committed and determined to achieve the objective,” he said when opening the national level World AIDS Day 2016 at the Borneo Kuching Convention Centre, here today.
Dr Subramaniam said to achieve the target, close cooperation, commitment and collaboration of relevant authorities and agencies is needed to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS.
He said though the number of HIV/AIDS cases in the country had dropped, there was still a serious concern in controlling the menace since 78% of the new cases reported were sexually transmitted cases.
“The transmission and infection of HIV cases in Malaysia in general has seen a change in trend starting 2010 - from drug addicts sharing needles to sex related cases.
“In 2015, 78.1% of the new HIV cases were sexually transmitted and 17% involved drug addicts,” he said.
Dr Subramaniam said the overall statistics for HIV/AIDS throughout the world has shown a drop of 35% since year 2000 while the number of deaths due to AIDS had dropped to 42% since 2004.
He said those who died of AIDS in 2015 dropped by 22% last year compared with 2002.
The rate of new HIV infection cases as at end 2015 was 10.9 for every 100,000 citizens and the figure is expected to drop to 10.7 for every 100,000 citizens by December 2016.
Dr Subramaniam said last year the government had spent RM202.1 million to carry out various programmes to combat HIV/AIDS and would continue to implement awareness programmes to control and prevent HIV/AIDS. — Bernama