Africa’s First Ladies seek to eliminate childhood HIV/AIDS by 2030

The Organisation of African First Ladies Against HIV/AIDS (OAFLA) and the African Union (AU) On Monday launched ‘Free To Shine’ a new campaign that aims to help end childhood AIDS in Africa by 2030 and keep mothers healthy.

Her Excellency Roman Tesfaye, First Lady of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia and President of OAFLA said while Africa has made unprecedented progress in responding to the AIDS epidemic, the response to childhood AIDS is lagging behind.

“To end the AIDS epidemic in Africa, we must act now to prioritize the use of knowledge and the implementation of tools that exist, to keep children AIDS free and their mothers healthy,” she added.

She said that preventing new HIV infections will transform Africa’s broader health and development agenda and provide children with a healthy and hopeful future.

While Her Excellency Amira El Fadil, Commissioner for Social Affairs at the African Union added that AIDS can not ended by 2030 if the focus is not on women and children therefore the ‘Free To Shine’ campaign will drive for increased investments to strengthen health systems and achieve maximum impact where the burden is highest. “The African Union is committed to ending AIDS as a public health threat by 2030, which will lay a strong foundation for Africa’s Agenda 2063 for socio-economic development and structural transformation,” she emphasized.

The campaign aims to unite people and organization from local to global levels and supports personal and collective understanding of the actions that can be taken to end childhood AIDS. The campaign will work to drive the effective delivery and use of healthcare services to keep mothers healthy, prevent mother to child transmission and ensure fast and effective identification and treatment of children infected by HIV.

To achieve its goal, the campaign will first focus on 2020 global targets for the elimination of mother to child transmission as outlined in the African Union’s Catalytic Framework to end AIDS, TB and Eliminate Malaria in Africa by 2030.