HIV transmission prevalence high in Kisii

By Kenan Miruka   

Kisii, Kenya: Nine in every 100 expectant mothers in Kisii County transmit the HIV virus to their babies, experts say.

Healthcare experts say 3,800 expectant mothers are diagnosed with the virus every year but only half of these access HIV treatment and care services.

The experts are now calling for scaling up of the Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission services in the county to arrest the situation.

Head of Care Kenya Kisii programme unit Dr William Ringera said the county has 73,000 HIV positive people but only 15,000 are accessing care and treatment services.

“Prevalence is increasing in Kisii County hence the need for interventions particularly in HIV testing, community linkages to health facilities, prevention of mother to child transmission along with care and treatment,” said Dr Ringera.

He spoke at Nyabururu while handing over 32 computers to the Kisii County government to be used for a Management Information System (MIS).

A recent report dubbed HIV Prevention Revolution Road Map 2013, ranked Kisii County among six counties that are contributing more than half of new HIV and Aids infections in the country.

“Our target as a county is to reduce HIV infections and prevalence well below the national average of 5.5 per cent by 2017. The level of awareness among the county’s population is wanting hence the poor health seeking behaviour,” said Governor James Ongwae.

He said the fact that Kisii County controls 60 per cent of the money market in Nyanza could be a contributing factor to the high HIV prevalence rates in the area.

“Perhaps we need to scale up our information systems to ensure we capture accurate data,” added Ongwae.