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Amon Mpofu

Munyaradzi Musiiwa Midlands Correspondent
THE National Aids Council is set to roll out an index testing for HIV where it will follow up on sexual partners of people who test HIV positive.

The move is meant to increase awareness in line with the global 90-90-90 targets.

The 90-90-90 is a concept introduced by the United Nations’ programme on HIV/AIDS in 2013.

The idea is to have 90 percent of people living with HIV know their status by 2020 and for them to access antiretroviral therapy to contain the disease.

In an interview during the National AIDS Council (NAC) tour of Midlands Province on Tuesday, NAC monitoring and evaluation director, Mr Amon Mpofu confirmed the development.

“We are going to scale up what we call index testing. Index testing is whereby we follow up someone who would have tested positive and trace their spouses or the people that they would have come contact with. We will try to counsel them and persuade them to get tested,” he said.

“We have seen that by so doing we increase the yield of people who are HIV positive and give them treatment.”

Mr Mpofu said NAC will soon roll out self-testing mainly targeting adolescents and the young generation in the wake of an increase in new HIV incidences among this age group.

He said the southern part of the country that includes Bulawayo, Matabeleland North and South had more incidences as compared to the northern part hence there was need to enhance HIV/AIDS interventions

“What we are going to introduce now is self-testing and roll it out. We are doing it so that people have access HIV testing everywhere.

We are targeting those that have not been tested and those that have been difficult to reach. These are the key population that involve sex workers, those who are in the periphery, gold panners and generally those who are difficult to get,” he said.

Mr Mpofu said the country generally had witnessed a steady decline in HIV prevalence and incidences.

“In terms of treatment we are currently at 66 percent and we are on course. We will meet the target of 90 percent if we do well in HIV testing,” he said.