THERE were 23 recorded HIV positive cases for children between January and September last year and 18 were through mother-to-child transmission.
In an interview with the media, Paediatric Consultant at the Labasa Hospital Dr Miriama Tukana said the cases of HIV in children were becoming a trend.
“In 2024, from January to September, we had about 23 positive cases of HIV in children,” Dr Tukana said.
“These children will be on lifelong medication for the rest of their life.
“Eighteen of those children were born to mothers who are HIV positive, and so they are born into risk out of no fault of their own, and they are to take these medications for life to suppress the disease.”
She said as pediatrician, it was sad to see children dying, and burdened by HIV.
“It’s sad to see that children are dying, are burdened with this disease and will be on medications for life.
“We really need to strengthen prevention. The prevention of HIV. It’s not just the health care that needs to be tasked with this. It’s the community as well. The community needs to take a hand in actively strategising preventing the spread of HIV.”
The total cases of HIV positive recorded last year was 1093.
