A signature campaign ahead of a high-level UN meeting on HIV/AIDS calls for countries to lift restrictions on travel for people with HIV

Ahead of a United Nations high-level meeting on AIDS in New York , from June 10-11, 2008, civil society organisations working in the field of HIV/AIDS have circulated a letter for signatures that will be sent to UN missions and heads of State of countries that impose travel restrictions on people with HIV. The letter protests the travel restrictions on the grounds that they are both discriminatory and unnecessary from the public health point of view.

The restrictions are also contrary to commitments made in the 2001 Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS and the 2006 Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS.

More than 70 countries still impose some form of HIV-specific restrictions on the entry and residence of HIV-positive people. Of these, 10 countries bar HIV-positive people from entering or staying in their country for any reason or length of time. There are close on 30 countries that deport people once their HIV infection is discovered. Over 70 countries do not have HIV-specific travel restrictions. For the remaining 49 countries, the information is either contradictory or unavailable.

The letter lists the most visible impact of the ban. HIV-positive people are denied entry into countries where major conferences or meetings on HIV are being held, thereby preventing them from sharing their experiences and expertise with a wider audience. Labour migrants are another major category of people affected. ‘Prospective migrants are either barred from entering a country when determined to be HIV-positive through a mandatory pre-departure HIV test, or are deported when required to take a periodic HIV test during their residence abroad, and test positively. Rarely is this type of HIV-testing confidential or linked to any other services, either in a person's country of origin or destination. This exposes to and places people who are already highly vulnerable in situations of great discrimination and economic devastation,' states the letter.

Likewise, people living with HIV who want to cross borders for the purposes of family reunification suffer the same restrictions.

Such bans and restrictions on travel ‘have no valid public health rationale and may in fact undermine HIV prevention and other efforts to stop the epidemic,' the letter adds. Both the World Health Organisation and the World Health Assembly back this view.

Moreover, the restrictions are ‘anachronisms, and highly inappropriate' in the age of globalisation, increased travel, treatment for HIV, and national and international commitments to universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support.

The letter says there is no proof that lifting travel restrictions will see HIV people flocking in, thereby adversely affecting a country's economy. In Brazil , where there is universal access to treatment and no travel restrictions, there has been no flood of HIV-positive travellers. Nor is it fair to single out HIV for adding to a country's health costs.

UNAIDS and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria are working together against such restrictions and have created an International Task Team on HIV-related Travel Restrictions, which comprises representatives of governments, UN agencies and civil society, including people living with HIV. They will be issuing their report and recommendations later this year, as well as providing tools to support governments in taking steps to remove the restrictions. The Global Fund decided that it would not hold board meetings in countries that restrict short-term entry of people living with HIV or require prospective HIV-positive visitors to declare their HIV status on entering.

Source: AIDS-INDIA eFORUM, June 2008