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Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Health has welcomed the decision by the Health Minister to have sexual education at primary school.

The Committee has also urged all South Africans to ensure that they know their HIV status as the country gears up for World Aids Day tomorrow. Chairperson of the Committee, Dr Bevan Goqwana said that there appeared to be an increase in teenage pregnancies, which was problematic.

To remedy this situation, Dr Goqwana said society needed to relook at their morals, and questions why young children were engaging in sexual activities. “The increase in teenage pregnancies shows that these young children are not only engaging in sexual activities, but are doing it without protection and having sexual education from primary schools might save the situation,” he said.

The Department of Health recently released the National HIV Prevalence survey results from 2010, and according to the results there is an increase in prevalence among older women, most noticeable in the 45 to 49-year-old age group. The Committee said it was disappointing to read that there was an increase as this was hampering the country’s fight against HIV.

Dr Goqwana said if the country wanted to reach the Millenium Development Goals, which aim to halve the infection rate by 2014, more needed to be done in the fight against the disease. He said it was important for South African citizens to know their HIV status as to get the necessary help should they be infected.

Government’s theme for World Aids Day for this year is: “Zero new infections, zero discrimination and zero Aids-related deaths”. Dr Goqwana said that this theme needed to be practiced to ensure a decrease in infections.

Dr Goqwana said that even though strides had been made to fight stigmatisation, it was still a reality for HIV-infected people. “As long as we still stigmatise HIV, people will run away from being tested and we as legislators need to be the leaders and pioneers in de-stigmatising HIV,” he said.

The Committee said it was important that the global fund for funding HIV programmes in the country be continued as to rid South Africa of the burden of the disease.

The Committee also said that the decrease in the price of Anti-retro viral treatment would aid in the fight against the disease even though alcohol and other substances were posing as a danger to the fight against the pandemic.