Speaker Rebecca Kadaga flagging off the Health walk that started the health week
The country Director United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS Musa Bungudu has asked parliament to negotiate with the cultural leaders to end practices of wife sharing among men to avoid the spread of HIV/AIDS. Bungunda made the remarks while speaking at the opening of the parliament health week at CHOGM ground in Kampala. He said that some of the cultural beliefs need to be dropped, calling for leaders’ intervention over this matter.
He calls on members of parliament and other leaders campaigning for leadership to include in their campaigns messages sensitizing the voters against HIV/AIDS. He continued to urge parliament to prevail over government to invest funds towards the establishment of HIV /AIDS trust fund to continue fighting this disease and said that 80% of the funds used to procure HIV/AIDS test kits is coming from donors, calling for preparation by government to bridge that funding gap.
The Acting Human resource Director with parliament Denson Okumu says that parliament of Uganda will work with all relevant government authorities to ensure that there is zero new HIV infection, as well as no discrimination and stigma.
Reports indicate that Uganda is second to South Africa with the highest rate of HIV infection and each week in Uganda 570 girls aged between 15 to 24 years get infected with HIV.