She said the results saw 46 women out of the 1,332 that were involved in the trials get infected with HIV.

She said the world needed a microbicide that was safe and effective to empower women who were more vulnerable to the virus.

“If we had this, this would empower women and they don’t have to negotiate with anyone,” she said.
Mataka said the reports on the trials were differing and the results but they revealed that there was yet to be a safe and effective microbicide.

She appealed to the funders of such research to invest more money and quickly because there was an urgent need for a gel.

“The women in taking part in the trial need to be told and explained to so that they fully understand when they agree to the trial. It is important to be very clear so that no one will say I got infected on trial. The community should be clear because maybe you are dealing with people that don’t have the information on scientific issues. If they fully understand, they will bear in mind when they make that decision with the full information. But the results were unfortunate because we need a microbicide very quickly,” said Mataka.

The University of Zambia Biomedical Research Ethics Committee (UNZAREC) recently said there was no cause to believe that the 46 women out of the 1,332 that were involved in the Mazabuka microbicide trials were infected as a result of their participation in the research.

And Mataka said Zambia was still on a high level of new HIV infections.

She said Zambia should not be satisfied with the 14.3 per cent prevalence rate of HIV because it was still unacceptably high.

She said over two decades had been spent fighting the epidemic and there was need to take advantage of the developments in the scientific world.

Mataka said there was need to completely eliminate the transmission of mother-to-child transmission.

“It should be possible to achieve this. We have the signs and the knowledge and we have the drugs so this year, we need to make concerted efforts to roll out PMTCT prevention of mother to child transmission to all pregnant women so that we eliminate transmission of mother to child,” she said. “I have noticed that prevention of new infections are going down. We have come down from 24 per cent to 14 per cent. That’s not enough; this is still unacceptably high level of infection.”

She said there was need to revive the energy that was there at the beginning and target the youth and the men.

However, Mataka emphasised that the social and economical climate for young people played a role to motivate behaviour change.

She said there were so many youths roaming the streets without a job.

Mataka said there was also need to concentrate on women and make it possible for them to escape risky behaviour.

She said there was need to go to rural areas and build capacity in their organisations.
Mataka said empowerment of women and girls was key to prevention.

She said alcohol and drug abuse had been identified as one of the drivers of the epidemic and there was need for more education on the matter.

“It would not work to say tell people to stop drinking but we need to tell people to drink responsibly knowing the dangers that come with that,” said Mataka.
 

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