Paraguayan HIV patients increase by 41 percent in five years

Asuncion, Aug 28 (Prensa Latina) The newspaper ABC Color reported today that the number of people infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) in Paraguay has increased by 41 percent in the last five years.

August 28, 2023
10:17

According to a report by the National AIDS/STI Control Program (Pronasida) of the Ministry of Public Health, quoted by the newspaper, the increase in HIV infection was alarming during this period.

Analyses detected some 5,000 new cases of HIV from 2018 to date, many of them among children and adolescents, while medical institutions across the country keep another 12,000 people in treatment, the source adds.

A particularly serious situation of the disease during the investigated period was the 2.62 percent increase in the number of infected people between 2018 (1,564 sick people) and 2019 (1,605), the Pronusida report points out.

The report reveals a subsequent decrease in HIV infections, but they shot up again between 2021 and 2022, when the percentage of new cases rose by 26.48 percent.

Decentralization in the treatment of the disease, as well as diagnostic tests through rapid tests were vital to advance in the treatment of the virus, the agency assures.

jrr/jav/mem/apb