Child and adolescent survival, health and development

La Paz, Bolivia – February 6, 2007 – Today the Thematic Group of the United Nations for HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) signed an agreement act with the Ministry of National Defence, the Ministry of Health and Sports, Command-in-chief of the Armed Force to implement the project “Adoption of Attitudes and Practices to Prevent HIV-AIDS at the interior of the Armed Forces”.

The project wants to contribute to the objective that professional personnel of the Armed Forces, soldiers, marines and pre-militaries assume responsible and safe sexual behaviours against STI and HIV-AIDS; promoting active participation of young people informing their mates about protection, prevention, respect and exercise of human rights.

With an investment of 75 thousand United States Dollars (from which UNAIDS will be in charge of 25 thousand and as counterparts the Ministry of Defence, the Ministry of Health and Sports, Nations’ Armed Forces and UNICEF will be in charge of the rest) approximately 53 thousand officers will be benefited.

The agreement act is signed by the Minister of National Defence, Walker San Miguel, the Minister of Health and Sports, Nila Heredia, the Commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of the Nation, Army General Wilfredo Vargas Valdez, the Resident Coordinator of the United Nation System in Bolivia, Antonio Molpeceres, and the Representative of UNICEF in Bolivia, Gordon Jonathan Lewis.

After signing the agreement between the Ministry of National Defence, the Ministry of Health and Sports and the Command-in-Chief of the Armed Force

The activities of the project will be carried out within the frame of the programme “Health Sentinel” of the Integral Instruction Programme for the Soldier, initiated in 1987, under the initiative of the Ministry of National Defence, the Ministry of Health and Sports and the Command-in-chief of the Armed Force. It will be focused in the knowledge and exercise of human rights, promoting the change towards healthy practices of sexual and reproductive health, and the reduction of the stigma and discrimination that affects people living with HIV or Aids.

The personnel of health of Operative Health Services of the Armed Force shall know and watch over the observance of the Ministerial Resolution 0711 at the interior of Military Units, the only legal regulation in force in the country up to now. At the same time, it will apply preventive measures with peace contingents coordinating the activities with the National Programme of STI-HIV/AIDS.

53.000 officers that participate in the project would voluntary and freely accede to HIV test in Operative Health Services of barracks. We are looking forward that this service not only helps in the training of new cases, and to stop the epidemiologic chain, but also bring young people nearer over the possibility of living with the virus and to understand that the HIV and Aids in Bolivia is a reality, and that we all can be affected if we do not take the necessary measurers.

Vulnerable population

In accordance to a worldwide research, carried out by UNAIDS, the military officers represent a vulnerable group of AIDS. The research showed that the risk of acquiring sexually transmitted infection in this group of the population is 2 to 5 times higher than in the civil population, due to different reasons, such as long periods away from home that causes loneliness feelings and sexual tension. The military values system tend to excuse or even to stimulate the adoption of risks (machismo), under group pressure.

On the matter, Dr. Christian Darras, President of the Thematic Group of the United Nations for HIV-Aids in Bolivia, emphasized that “most of the soldiers are young people between 17 and 24 years old, sexually active; some of them can be attracted by commercial sexual workers that are located near military camps, which increments the possibility of become infected with sexually transmitted infections if they do not use condoms. When they return to their families, the soldiers infected with ITS or HIV can transmit the infection to their “regular” couples or donating blood without testing it”.

HIV/AIDS in Bolivia

Bolivia is a multiethnic and multicultural country that suffers of several migrations from rural areas to urban areas. The migratory processes, the machismo, the excessive consumption of alcohol, lack of information and knowledge about HIV and Aids, their ways of transmission and prevention, high rates of violence, and the existence of prejudices and false believes in relation to the subject matter, favours the quickly transmission of STI and HIV in the country.

Nevertheless, in Bolivia there is the false belief that the HIV-Aids only affects to the (mistakenly called) risks groups, reason for which most part of the medicine personnel and of the general population do not considers the possibility of being infected. Nowadays, some population sectors begin to experiment the consequences of Aids, and the prevention actions and strengthening of the services are a demand of these groups and of the institutions that work in the thematic.

According to the National Programme of HIV/STI/Aids of the Ministry of Health and Sports, up to September 2006, 2.121 people are living with HIV or Aids, nevertheless in according to the report of UNAIDS there could be a sub-register of approximately 86% of the cases, meaning that there could be more than 20 thousand people affected.