Wigwe Seeks Collective Responsibility to End HIV Transmission

By Modupe Gbadeyanka

The Group Managing Director of Access Bank Plc, Herbert Wigwe, has called for collective responsibility to put an end to HIV transmission in Nigeria.

The banker made this known at the launch of the $100 million HIV Trust Fund in Abuja this week, urging the private sector to rise up to the occasion by working in collaboration with the government in the area of ownership in sustaining the HIV response.

“However, the original emergency Plan to fight AIDS must transform into a Sustained Response that prevents new infections and ensures those on treatment stay on treatment.

“The era of sustainability demands that Africans take responsibility and ownership for the end of AIDS in Africa,” he said.

Mr Wigwe, who said that Nigeria currently had the third largest HIV epidemic statistics worldwide, said over 80 per cent of the funding had been mainly from international donors.

According to him, the Nigerian private sector currently contributes about 2 per cent of total funds allocated to HIV.

He urged the private sector to collectively join hands in the ownership of the funding to eradicate HIV in Nigeria, asserting the readiness of Access bank to support an improved health system.

“Access Bank is not known for complacency. We are known for our drive for financial and economic growth, for leadership in national health issues.

“Particularly the national response to COVID, and we are known for our commitment to sustainability, especially relating to strengthening our national health system.

“With less than half of people living with HIV having access to treatment or adequate care, Access Bank partnered with other private sector organizations here from the Nigerian Business Coalition Against AIDS (NiBUCAA)

“To educate our staff, raise public awareness and support individuals living with HIV/AIDS,” the Access Bank chief stated.

Mr Wigwe explained that the bank had also conceived of this national HIV Trustfund, as a N50 billion private sector-led mechanism to pool our resources to provide significant sustainable inputs required to scale up the impact of the AIDS response in Nigeria.

He expressed the commitment of Access bank and other private sectors to ensuring that mothers were tested and drugs provided to end mother to child transmission.

Also speaking, the Chairman of Dangote Group, Mr Aliko Dangote, agreed totally with Mr Wigwe, stressing that it was a collective responsibility of all to bring the number of persons living with HIV to zero.

Mr Dangote said that the money to be realised in the launch would be channelled to getting all pregnant tested and treated, calling on the private sector to work with the public sector at an equal frequency to end HIV in Nigeria.

Information from the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) was used in this story.