BY MUNYARADZI BLESSING DOMA
There is need to highlight HIV prevention campaigns in elderly patients, as it has been noted that there is an emerging challenge of increasing number of people aged 50 and above living with the virus, an HIV Clinician has revealed.
Doctor Cleophas Chimbetete revealed this on Tuesday during a media science cafe on “HIV and Ageing”, organised by the Health Communicators Forum and the Humanitarian Information Facilitation Centre.
He revealed that over the years, there seems to have been more focus on the younger generation, whilst a lot of issues concerning the elderly patients were emerging.
“There is a realisation that there is an emerging challenge of more and more elderly patients living with HIV in their old age, so in terms of strategies to address this problem number one; we need to highlight HIV prevention even in elderly patients.
“Those of us who are involved in HIV prevention campaigns such as PrEP (Pre Exposure Prophylaxis), such as circumcision, whatever form of HIV prevention campaigns, let’s include the elderly as well.
“Realizing that they remain at risk of new infections,” said Dr Chimbetete.
He further revealed that as elderly patients visit health institutions for any other medical reasons, personnel should offer HIV testing, so that they (elderly patients) are not left behind.
“Number two; when we see elderly patients coming to our hospitals, facilities, for whatever medical reason; let’s offer HIV testing because we have noticed a delay in HIV diagnosis.
“Because some of the symptoms of HIV infections in this age group, they mimic old age and they are just dismissed as part of the ageing process and we don’t want late diagnosis of HIV in this generation of people.
“We also realise that HIV is a risk factor for a number of other conditions, so people living with HIV in old age are more likely to have other conditions such as hypertension, such as diabetes, mental health issues, such as also being at greater risk of cancers such as cervical cancer.
“So us as care providers we must now offer a holistic approach or comprehensive approach to the care of elderly patients.
“We don’t want OI (Opportunistic Infections) clinics that just look at viral loads, without BP machines, without glucometers to test blood sugar.
“We don’t want health care workers who only understand HIV management and not understand our national guidelines in terms of how we manage hypertension, how we manage diabetes, how we screen for common cancers. “So we want a holistic approach, we are offering free services for HIV clients and these services must also mean that we offer free treatment where possible for these common non communicable conditions,” added Dr Chimbetete.
Doctor Trevor Kanyowa, World Health Organisation (WHO) Zimbabwe, Technical Lead Healthier Populations, said the trend of a number of older people living with HIV is being noticed, not only locally but regionally and globally.
“This is mainly because of two reasons; the first reason is that we now have effective anti retroviral medicines of high quality and these medicines are enabling people to live healthier and longer lives.
“So we have people who acquired the HIV virus even before they had aged, managing to grow into the older age groups still living with the virus but living healthy and longer lives.
“The other reason is that whilst we know that even at younger age groups, HIV is still being acquired, we have also noticed that the risk of acquiring it in older ages has also increased, this is for a number of reasons.
“The reasons include the issue of the information that people have, for example there is a general belief that HIV is for younger people so therefore older people are less likely to use protective measures as compared to the other age groups.
“We also notice that for instance, older persons may lose a partner and then may opt to go into a new relationship, they may opt to marry or opt to live with a boyfriend or a girlfriend but there is not that much effort to check one’s status in that age group and as a consequence, they acquire the infections.
In 2022 UNAIDS estimated that 24 percent or 4,2 million of people living with HIV (PLHIV) globally were aged 50 years and older and in Zimbabwe, 22 percent of PLHIV (28 407) are 50 years and older.
“So these are the main things that are making us see that we have HIV rates increasing in the older age groups,” said Dr Kanyowa.
He also revealed that it has been noticed that the figures of young people acquiring HIV are dropping, whilst the population with HIV in the older age group is rising.
“If you then look at it as a proportion, it will appear very much bigger in the older age group.
“This is what we are noticing and these trends are what we need to focus our responses on,” added Dr Kanyowa.
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