THE number of Mzansi’s girls being infected with HIV is shockingly high.
According to a report in the Citizen, Higher Education and Training HIV/AIDS Programme (HEAIDS) reports that the number of new infections per week was now 1,200 among girls in the 15 to 24-year age group.
Statistics also show that 32% of students had been pregnant or had made someone pregnant, with 75% of the pregnancies being unplanned.
The number of young girls infected weekly with HIV in South Africa had dropped, according to the but still remained unacceptably high.
Three years ago, the weekly infection rate within the same age group was 2,000.
These worrying numbers were revealed in a presentation by Dr. Ramneek Ahluwalia of HEAIDS, which he delivered in Durban on Wednesday.
HEAIDS is a government initiative that falls under the higher education and training department.
It provides and supports HIV mitigation programmes to the country’s approximately two million students.Ahluwalia was part of a panel presentation on youth health and wellness.
He was speaking to a capacity audience at the Albert Luthuli International Convention Centre on the second day of the 9th South African AIDS Conference, which runs until Friday.
