Lalitpur, September 28:

The government’s policies and programmes on HIV prevention are not being translated into proper implementation at the national level, an expert on HIV said at an advocacy workshop here today. Presenting a working paper on International Concern on Population and Development (ICPD) Programmes of Action (PoA), Dr Sharad Onta, associate professor at the Institute of Medicine, said that the differences between the adoption and implementation of HIV strategies in Nepal were not encouraging.

“The national strategies are not gender sensitive as they do not ensure the accessibility of services to women though the strategies are committed to ICPD. By and large, they are only useful in addressing the problems of sexually transmitted infections and increased risk of fertility.” He said there were inadequate legal provisions to protect the rights of vulnerable people and PLWHA(People living with HIV/AIDS). “There is the need for urgency to act according to the human rights approach to prevent and manage HIV/AIDS as mentioned in the national strategy,” Dr Onta said.

“According to the policy guidelines, Voluntary Counselling and Testing (VCT) services are provided free of cost to the people but care and support services to the PLWHA are inadequate. And the majority of risk groups has no access to the (VCT) services,” Dr Onta said. “Despite the national strategy’s commitment to provide services to the people affected by HIV/AIDS such as orphans and widows, the policies are not being carried out in practice. This increases their vulnerability to HIV infections,” he stressed. Addressing the meet, the Chief Executive Officer of Family Planning Association of Nepal Hari Khanal said: “Nepal has expressed commitments to international forums like ICPD, UN General Assembly Special Session on HIV/AIDS and Millennium Development Goals.” Khanal said the government is committed to fight HIV/AIDS.