2023-06-23 22:00:46
In the Netherlands people die unnecessarily from AIDS. Doctors determine too late that a patient is infected with the HIV virus, which means that treatment does not start on time. This is reported by the research platform ‘Pointer’, which broadcasts the program ‘The forgotten epidemic’ on NPO Radio 1 on Sunday evening.
Pointer has found that in five years a total of 22 people have died of AIDS and 365 others had to be hospitalized. In the broadcast, internist-infectiologist Casper Rokx of the Erasmus MC in Rotterdam says that these are ‘all victims who could have been prevented if they had started treatment in time’.
Doctors have become less alert to HIV
It is important to detect an HIV infection in time. The later, the greater the chance of a (too) low immune system, with all the associated risks. Late detection may already indicate AIDS.
In the radio broadcast, internist at the OLVG Amsterdam Kees Brinkman says: “I see people in my consulting room with severe pneumonia, brain abscesses and various forms of cancer. A large proportion of these patients have already reached the AIDS stage.” They have seen a doctor before, but have not been tested for HIV. One reason is that this disease no longer occurs often, so doctors are less alert to it. Another factor, Pointer reports, is that doctors (wrongly) think of HIV mainly as homosexual men with many sexual contacts.
The National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) reported on Friday that more sexually transmitted infections (STIs) were diagnosed last year than the year before. In particular, the number of infections with gonorrhea rose. This concerns 10,600 diagnoses in 2022, an increase of 33 percent. The number of chlamydia infections also rose sharply; 24,684 diagnoses in the past year, an increase of 21 percent.
The RIVM also reports that in 2022, 144 people received an HIV diagnosis at the Center for Sexual Health (CSG). That is slightly more than in 2021, when it was 138 people.
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