Exposure factors for HIV+ female sex workers in Mali

The HIV epidemic is a global public health problem that affects the world and particularly developing countries with epidemiological facies dominated by communicable diseases. Today, although the global situation in the fight against AIDS shows encouraging results in terms of testing, West Africa is lagging behind in reaching the UNAIDS targets and Mali is among the countries lagging behind in the race to reach the 2020 targets.According to the Spectrum 2020 and the annual report of the sectoral unit for the fight against AIDS, tuberculosis and hepatitis 2019, the number of people estimated to be living with HIV is 144,376 and up to the end of 2019 only 54,327 PLHIV have been identified, i.e. 38%. In view of this considerable delay, Mali, with the support of technical and financial partners, has developed new strategies to accelerate screening and achieve better performance by the end of 2020. Our study focuses on the index testing strategy, which has an undeniable added value in terms of screening.

Autorentext

Dr. Almahdi Ag Alitini, medical doctor specializing in international public health and humanitarian action, with a university degree in retrovirology; program manager for the fight against HIV among key populations at the SOUTOURA association in Mali with 7 years of experience in project and program management.