World AIDS day is celebrated worldwide

Yesterday, December 1st was celebrated as world AIDS day both nationally and internationally. Activities to celebrate this special day had been going for the whole week and ended yesterday. These activities, amongst others were outreach activities and free HIV and AIDS screening.
Michel Sidibé, Executive Director of UNAIDS has urged the world to commemorate this year’s world AIDs day by highlighting the importance of the right to health and the challenges that people living with and affected by HIV face in fulfilling that right.
To him, the right to health is a fundamental human right, and everybody has the right to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health, as enshrined in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.
Hear him; “The world will not achieve the Sustainable Development Goals—which include the target of ending AIDS by 2030—without people attaining their right to health. The right to health is interrelated with a range of other rights, including the rights to sanitation, food, decent housing, healthy working conditions and a clean environment”.
“The right to health means many different things: that no one person has a greater right to health care than anyone else; that there is adequate health-care infrastructure; that health-care services are respectful and non-discriminatory; and that health care must be medically appropriate and of good quality. But the right to health is more than that—by attaining the right to health, people’s dreams and promises can be fulfilled”.
In his message to the world, the Executive Director said significant steps on the way to meeting the 90–90–90 treatment targets towards ending AIDS by 2030. “Nearly 21 million people living with HIV are now on treatment and new HIV infections and AIDS-related deaths are declining in many parts of the world. But we shouldn’t be complacent. In eastern Europe and central Asia, new HIV infections have risen by 60% since 2010 and AIDS-related deaths by 27%. Western and central Africa is still being left behind. Two out of three people are not accessing treatment. We cannot have a two-speed approach to ending AIDS”.