The central jail of the provincial capital Peshawar has been declared sensitive because of the prisoners but now the deadly disease of AIDS has also been confirmed there due to which its sensitivity has increased further.
It should be remembered that HIV has been confirmed in 16 prisoners of Central Jail Peshawar.
Talking to the media yester, Superintendent Central Jail Peshawar Muhammad Wasim Khan said that HIV was confirmed during the blood screening of the prisoners. According to the infected inmates are drug addicts who are kept separately from other inmates. He further said that there are 3400 inmates in the Central Jail at present while HIV infected inmates are being treated and counselled, which is very important.
The need to pay full attention so that this disease does not spread to other drug addicts. Agreeing to the claims of the jail authorities, these prisoners have been kept separately, but now those 16 prisoners have fallen victim to it, there is no need to take any more precautions.
It should be remembered that the main reason for the spread of AIDS among the prisoners of Central Jail Peshawar is that there are many AIDS patients in Peshawar and Bannu, in which some people even reach the jail after committing crimes. According to a report, the number of registered patients in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in 2023 are 898, they have treated for free under the AIDS control program.
It should be noted that the data provided by the HIV, Hepatitis and Thalassemia Control Program in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa indicates that 898 HIV-positive cases were registered here in 2023, while 1,25 patients were registered in 2022.
A web report said that the total number of registered HIV positive patients in the province has reached 6 thousand 966. According to the record, the highest number of 1 thousand 274 registered people live in Peshawar while Bannu is on the second place with 874 patients.
The number of registered HIV-positive persons from the merged districts is 1071, of which 282 are the residents of North Waziristan. 10 from Gilgit-Baltistan, 58 from Punjab, 34 from Sindh and 11 from Balochistan in various centers of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
In addition, 201 Afghans are also benefiting from free medical facilities. Among the registered HIV-positive people in the province are 4,865 men, 1,573 women, 107 transgender and 421 children, 260 boys and 161 girls. Meanwhile, US National Institutes of Health (NIH) says that the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) begins an attack on the body’s immune system against diseases. If left untreated, the virus can cause AIDS, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, which is the worst stage of HIV infection.
The virus can be transmitted to others through accidental needle sharing, blood transfusions, pregnancy and breastfeeding. The NIH says that if HIV is controlled, the risk of transmitting the virus is close to zero. The only way to control it is with antiretroviral therapy (ART), drugs that kill HIV in the blood reduces the level of HIV, called viral load. According to the NIH, antiretroviral drugs (ART) can eliminate the risk of HIV transmission.
In this treatment, tablets, capsules or long-term injections are given to the patient. According to the provincial AIDS control program, 4,132 out of 6,966 patients in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had unprotected sex, 807 used syringes or needles and 630. People are infected with HIV through the blood of infected people.
Statistics shows that most cases of HIV transmission occur due to unprotected sex. Therefore, the prison administration needs to take measures to prevent the mutual disorders of the prisoners so that this disease cannot spread further and the series of timely testing of newly arriving prisoners should also be examine thus that this disease cannot spread to other prisoners.
