The Minister of Health, Prof Isaac Adewole during the dissemination of guidelines and reports of Laboratory-based evaluations of the Alere HIV Combo rapid test kit said that country has made significant progress in the control of HIV and is on course to attaining the UNAIDS global 90-90-90 targets.
The Minister of Health noted that current data reveals that there are 1.9 million persons living with HIV in Nigeria and that about 1.1 million on ART, adding that in order to meet the target for the first 90, Nigeria must have 1.71 million people, who know their status by testing and identifying up to 600,000 HIV positive persons by December 2020.
Also in attendance was the Director of Public Health, Dr. Evelyn Ngige, who noted that to ensure accurate and reliable diagnosis of HIV infection in Nigeria, the National AIDS/STIs Control Programme of the Federal Ministry of Health, in collaboration with Development Partners has been conducting evaluations of HIV rapid test kits (RTKs) to determine their suitability for placement in the national HIV testing algorithm.
