Chijioke Iremeka Health professsionals have said the rising cases of adolescent girls living with HIV globally will worsen mother-to-child transmission of the infection if not urgently checked. The physicians stated that as more young women become infected, the risk of potential vertical transmission was also high since HIV could be transmitted from the mother, not on treatment to the child during childbirth or breastfeeding. They cautioned that the situation could lead to new generations of children born with HIV, thereby, perpetuating the cycle of infection and increasing the overall burden on healthcare systems.
The United Nations Children’s Fund recently revealed that 75 percent of the new HIV infections among adolescents globally occur in girls. The Chief of the UNICEF Field Office for South-West Nigeria, Celine Lafoucriere, disclosed this in a statement to commemorate the International Day of the girl-child. “To ramp up our efforts in the fight against AIDS, there is a need for more concentrated focus on adolescents and young people.
New HIV infections among both adolescent boys and girls are not declining nearly quickly enough to reach the 2030 targets,” UNICEF added. According to Statista, a global data and business intelligence platform, Nigeria’s female population was approximately 110.67 million, while the male population amounted to approximately 113.
13 million inhabitants. Speaking exclusively with PUNCH Healthwise in different interviews, the experts sai.
