Foreigners to start receiving free HIV treatment in Botswana in December

On Wednesday, Botswana's Ministry of Health informed its health personnel that they must commence providing HIV services to non-citizens beginning December.

The intention of the Ministry of Health of Botswana is to ensure that every foreigner, who have so far been denied access to life-saving treatment, must receive services at all public and government health facilities.

A memo from the Ministry of Health said this will start with HIV testing, linkage to antiretroviral treatment including laboratory testing, prevention of mother-to-child infections, sexually transmitted infections and TB prevention therapy.

The model of implementation will be an integrated approach of HIV services at all public or government health facilities.

The memo further revealed that since this is a new project there will be a lot of challenges in the beginning but every effort should be made to ensure the majority of HIV-infected foreigners are offered the services and that there is reporting to the national level to enable quantification and costing of the service.

According to the memo, in order for Botswana to achieve epidemiological control, the country should drastically reduce the number of new infections. "This can however not be achieved if there are people residing in the country who have HIV but do not know their HIV status and not on treatment," it said.