The APPG welcomes the report published by the House of Lord’s Select Committee on HIV in the UK which claims that the current priority given to preventing HIV and AIDS in the UK is “woefully inadequate.”

The report is published on the 25th anniversary of the “Don’t Die of Ignorance” campaign, and the Select Committee was chaired by Lord Fowler, former Vice-Chair of the APPG who ran the original 1986 campaign.
Speaking about the report, which is titled “no vaccine, no cure,” Lord Fowler said that its key message was about HIV prevention:

“Prevention must be the key policy. One essential message remains the same as in the 1980s: the more the partners, the greater the risk. Protect yourself. Use a condom.”
The report says that the numbers accessing care have trebled since 2000 and that HIV and AIDS remains one of the most serious public health issues confronting the Government at the start of the 21st century.

The Committee spent more than eight months examining how HIV and AIDS is being dealt with inside the UK. It found that:

• The problem is growing. By next year there will be over 100,000 people living with HIV. The number of patients has trebled in the last ten years. Treatment costs have increased vastly and now approach £1 billion a year. Although antiretroviral drugs have dramatically cut the death toll there is still neither vaccine nor cure.

• More than a quarter of those infected have not been diagnosed and are unaware of their condition. This affects the individual concerned and also spreads the disease further. Better testing must be a priority. The Committee proposes routine testing for all new patients at GP surgeries and general medical admissions beginning in areas where the prevalence of HIV is highest. The Committee also proposes the legalisation and regulation of home testing.

• Spending on prevention is seriously inadequate. HIV is entirely preventable but the latest figures show that the Government spent only £2.9 million on national prevention programmes, compared with £762 million on treatment. In a number of cases general sexual health campaigns have made no mention of HIV. This disparity of spending persists despite the fact that preventing one infection avoids a lifetime of treatment, estimated to cost between £280,000 and £360,000.

• Widespread public ignorance must be tackled. It recommends that a new national campaign should be mounted to tackle the ignorance and misunderstanding which still exist. A better understanding of HIV would also help tackle persisting stigma and discrimination – which prevents people coming forward for testing. The teaching of issues related to HIV and AIDS in schools is inadequate, with one survey showing that a quarter of young people had not learnt about HIV and AIDS in the classroom. New measures need to be pursued urgently.

Pamela Nash, Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on HIV and AIDS welcomed the report’s publication, saying:

“This report comes at a crucial time as the Department of Health is deciding on the future of the NHS reforms, and we are calling on the Government to consider its recommendations very carefully. It is regrettable that many young people are no longer aware of the risks of HIV, and I support Lord Fowler’s calls for greater public awareness.”

Chris Mortimer, Patient Representative at the Mortimer Market Centre in London said:

“The public perception of HIV and its treatment is 15 years out of date. HIV is no longer a death sentence. Getting tested is the best thing a person can do. Ignorance and late diagnosis, on the contrary can still mean illness, hospitalisation or worse.”

Simon Kirby, Vice-Chair of the APPG also praised the report, saying:

“This report is the wake-up call that we need: next year there will be over 100,000 people living with HIV in the UK, and over a quarter of HIV infections remain undiagnosed. It is time to break the silence and stigma around HIV and this report is a very welcome step in helping us to do that. The All Party Parliamentary Group on HIV and AIDS will be campaigning for the recommendations of Lord Fowler’s report to be taken forward.”

The report also emphasised the success of clean needle exchange programmes in preventing HIV transmission and recommends that further work should be done to prevent the spread of HIV in prisons, including opt-out testing for all new inmates.