PSI statement on World AIDS Day, 1 December 2009

The 7 million health care workers in 156 countries represented by PSI, are keenly aware of the human impact of the AIDS epidemic. We are also aware of the tremendous burden it places on the capacity of health systems where our members work. Our members are in the frontlines of the fight against AIDS, and we are therefore deeply vested in ensuring that efforts to deal with the epidemic are as effective as they can be.

Unfortunately, twenty five years after AIDS was first recognized, the number of people infected with HIV continues to grow.

In 2001, 27,900,000 people around the world were HIV-infected. In 2007, the number had grown to over 33 million. That year, 1.8 to 2.3 million people were estimated to have died as a result of AIDS.

Effective policies and campaigns to prevent the spread of HIV infection remain a key component in the fight to stop the AIDS epidemic.

Providing more AIDS patients with antiretroviral therapies is not enough. The number of newly infected people continues to outpace our progress in extending treatment to those already afflicted with the disease.

We believe that workplace-based HIV-education and prevention program can be an effective tool in the fight against AIDS. We have a unique opportunity to capture young people’s attention in a continued and sustainable way at the workplace, where they come repeatedly on a reliable basis.

Where we have initiated such programs they have been followed by workplace HIV testing and treatment programs. Union-organized programs that are supported by management have the advantage that workers are more likely to participate, as they feel that having been tested, if they are found to be positive and seek treatment, they are less vulnerable to being stigmatized, marginalized or losing their employment.

Effective prevention and treatment efforts also require adequate numbers of health workers. Yet, the world is facing a shortage of health workers. The WHO estimates that we need an additional 4.3 million health workers to be able to provide basic primary care to all those who need it. Our efforts to deal with the AIDS epidemic will forever be hampered by this shortage, which, paradoxically, is more critical in those countries which have the highest prevalence of HIV infection and AIDS. In the interconnected global community in which we now live, it is in everybody’s interest that we have sufficient health workers in the frontlines of advancing epidemics that eventually will reach us all if they are not stopped and eradicated.

Furthermore, those health workers need to be protected. They are at risk of becoming infected at their workplace, through contact with infected blood, most frequently through needle stick injuries with contaminated syringes.

PSI launched a campaign at the end of 2007 to promote the use of safe injection devices, such as retractable syringes. The use of retractable syringes protects patients, as these devices can not be reused, and reuse of syringes is still a source of HIV infection is some poor countries. But they also protect nurses, laboratory personnel and doctors as well as waste collectors from the risk of HIV infection.

This policy has been recommended by the WHO for several years, but it was not until health worker unions affiliated with PSI launched our current campaign, that we have began to see rapid progress. Governments, international financial institutions and Global Health Initiatives must make the resources available for the prompt shift to safe injection devices. The European Federation of Public Service Unions (EPSU) has signed a European-wide agreement with the European Hospital and Healthcare Employers’ Association (HOSPEEM) on measures to tackle the issue of injuries from sharps (such as needlesticks) in hospitals. The European Social Partners will ask for the Commission to present this agreement to the Council of Ministers to implement it through an EU directive.

Protection and treatment of health workers in the frontlines of the fight against AIDS is an essential component. PSI remains committed to this task and calls all those fighting against the epidemic to join us.

Peter Waldorff
PSI General Secretary

For further information, contact PSI's Health Officer Jorge.Mancillas@world-psi.org and visit the PSI Health Blog http://healthblog.world-psi.org.