Regional government officials did not discuss their initiative with the Ministry despite the fact that they were obliged to, Russian Foreign Ministry's Spokesperson Maria Zakharova told AIDS.CENTER website.
Various Russian media sources reported earlier that the Ural region capital is ready to become the first city in Russia to join the Paris Declaration on ending the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Citing the Minister of Healthcare of the Sverdlovsk Region Andrei Tsvetkov and his Deputy Elena Chadova, local media write about that, too.
TASS released the same information on Friday. “The Paris Declaration on fast-track ending the HIV/AIDS” implies that the city government is ready to pledge their commitment to attaining the 90-90-90 targets and achieving the established goals by 2020.
The above figures stand for the following: 90% of people living with HIV must know their HIV status, 90% out of them must be on antiretroviral treatment and in addition to that 90% of people on treatment must get undetectable viral loads which means the virus is suppressed to the amount when its carrier presents no risk to the others and cannot pass on the virus to their partner even through regular condomless sex.
In relation to the overall population of HIV positive people this means that 90% of the infected must know their status, 81% must receive treatment and 72,9% maintain an undetectable viral load.
In Europe only the richest or relatively small countries like Denmark, Sweden and Slovakia have been able to achieve these targets. And for example in Eastern Europe average figures are 57-45-57%. In Russia official statistics suggests that 71,7% of people know their status and only 38,1% use HIV treatment medication. The number of people with suppressed viral load is not known at all.
It is considered impossible to raise the figures without cutting-age prevention programs such as replacement therapy for injecting drug users, especially if their number is high, pre-exposure prophylaxis programs and increased attention to key groups.
It is yet unknown how the Sverdlovsk region is going to meet their commitments. As to replacement therapy, for instance, it is forbidden in Russia and HIV services NGOs frequently have to deal with the state forces interference via the Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Internal Affairs and Federal Communications and Mass Media Oversight Service.