Wise Up to World AIDS Day

The Health Promotion Agency for Northern Ireland (HPA) in partnership with the Sexual Health Information Exchange Group (SHIEG) has today voiced its support for World AIDS Day, the international day of action on HIV and AIDS, which takes place annually on 1 December. A key theme of this year’s UK campaign is to encourage people to Wise Up to the facts about HIV and AIDS and to Wear It - the red ribbon to support those living with the disease.

In Northern Ireland since records began, a total of 520 people have attended the Genito Urinary Medicine (GUM) clinics to receive treatment for HIV and 92 people have died from AIDS-related illnesses.¹

Carmel Kelly, Clinical Nurse Specialist at the GUM Clinic, Royal Victoria Hospital said: ”Because we know there are people living with HIV who are unaware of their diagnosis, we have recently started to offer HIV testing routinely to all new attendees at the clinic. While we know there is a huge emotional impact from a HIV diagnosis we also believe there are benefits.

“Diagnosis at an early stage allows us to monitor the impact of the virus on the body, and opens the opportunities for treatment to postpone further illness and can help to prevent further new infections. We know from routine antenatal testing that we can greatly reduce the transmission of HIV from mother to child, if the mother is aware of her infection.”

Between 2003 and 2004 the number of new cases of HIV diagnosed in Northern Ireland has almost doubled (63 new cases in 2004 compared to 32 new cases in 2003) and 3 new cases of AIDS were diagnosed in 2004, compared to one in 2003.²

Dr Brian Gaffney, Chief Executive of the HPA said: “Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) continue to rise at an alarming rate in Northern Ireland, with new cases of HIV increasing steadily over the past six years. People in Northern Ireland need to ‘wise up’ to the fact that HIV is here and that the number of the infections will continue to escalate if the safer sex message is ignored.

“There are strong links between risky sexual behaviour, particularly among young people, and the misuse of alcohol and drugs which can have serious implications for both their physical and mental health. Practising safer sex is the best protection against the spread of a range of STIs including HIV.”

Globally there are an estimated 40.3 million people living with HIV with 5 million new infections every year. In 2005 more than 3 million people died from AIDS-related illnesses, of which more than 500,000 were children.³

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Notes to the Editor:
Further information about the UK campaign for World AIDS Day is available at: www.worldaidsday.org and for World events, visit: www.worldaidscampaign.org

The HPA currently promotes awareness of safer sex through a poster campaign aimed at 18 to 30 year olds. The posters are currently displayed in pubs and nightclubs across Northern Ireland.

SHIEG is a network of health professionals from the four Health and Social Service Boards, the HPA, the Genito Urinary Medicine Clinic at the Royal Victoria Hospital and Barnardos. The aim of the group is to exchange information, plan joint training events and promote awareness of sexual health issues.

For media enquiries contact:
Rosie McGaughey or Jenny Dougan at the HPA – Tel: 9031 1611.

1 Cumulative totals of HIV and AIDS by 30 September 2005, Genitourinary Medicine Clinic, Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast.
2 Northern Ireland statistics for HIV and AIDS are available from the Health Protection Agency website: www.hpa.org.uk/infections/topics_az/hiv_and_sti/hiv/epidemiology/introduction.htm
3 www.unaids.org/epi2005/doc/EPlupdate2005_pdf_en/epi-update2005_en.pdf