Senior Minister His Excellency Ieng Mouly Holds Working Meeting With Dr. Steve Wignall, Project Director for LINKAGES/FHI 360
Senior Minister His Excellency Ieng Mouly, Chair of the National AIDS Authority, held a working meeting, at the National AIDS Authority Headquarters on the afternoon of December 30, 2019, with Dr. Steve Wignall, Program Director LINKAGES; Mrs Seng Sopheap, FHI360 Country representative; Mrs. Nith Sopha, Technical Advisor for HIV test services and anti-discrimination; Mr. Sopha Ratana, Technical advisor for behavior change, and Mr. Im Chanry, Technical advisor for Strategy Information, with the participation of the authority’s top leaders, such as His Excellency Tia Phalla, His Excellency Ros Seilavath, His Excellency Sut Thang Phann, and His Excellency Chhea Sithi.
The discussion centered on recent figures showing the surge in challenges among the key population, especially among the men having sex with men and transgender people, and on new strategies to prevent HIV infection as follows:
1. HIV self-testing;
2. Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP), and
3. Enhancement of education dissemination through social media.
The new figures show that the behavior of men having sex with men and transgender people is more and more increasingly facing HIV infection, such as having sex with multiple partners at group sex parties in combination with drug use to boost sexual desire, when, in general, the rate of condom use was low due to the lack of sufficiently preparing condoms and lubricant. The figures also show that among the men having sex with men and transgender people the HIV rate has increased two-fold if compared to the 2015.
To respond to this situation, organizational experts have advised that promoting the strategy of HIV self-testing and fast-tracking the strategy of using HIV-preventive medications should be taken into further consideration to encourage condom use, which seems to be less effective among men having sex with men and transgender people having the new style of sexual behavior. On top of this, organizational activists, too, have been composing and producing video clips for disseminating HIV prevention education to these groups to be posted on social media and encourage discrimination reduction through the disseminated information having it that Undetectable HIV is equal to Untransmittable HIV.
His Excellency the Senior Minister said that the National AIDS Authority planned to revise all previous educational documents and video clips to assess whether they are still suitable in order to consider if they will be allowed to continue or otherwise.
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