Zyrnx John Octavio, HIV/AIDS Core Team (HACT) nurse and HIV counselor of the City Health Office (CHO) said the data was based on detected cases since last year.
Octavio revealed the youngest person who contracted HIV is a 16-year-old male, whose identity is kept confidential due to the very sensitive issue of HIV/AIDS.
The city health official said the male victim is now undergoing antiretroviral therapy (ART) through the city’s Social Hygiene Clinic.
“Our cases are getting younger and this is really a concern for us right now,” he said in an interview with the media
Based on their initial investigation on the rise of HIV/AIDS cases, the health official blames social media and dating sites as contributory factors in the fast rise of the disease in General Santos.
Another factor that Octavio is the lack of awareness of the continued dangers of the disease among city residents who don’t practice safe safe sex to protect themselves from contracting the virus.
Last year, the city health official said, 30 individuals were declared positive of HIV from the 315 individuals who volunteered to undergo testing through the clinic.
He said since January, the office has recorded a total of 88 new cases of the dreaded disease and 27 persons were also detected in July.
The CHO report also said that those who have contracted the disease aged 22 to 25 years old and were engaged in “risky sexual behaviors, while others have multiple partners.
The victims, Octavio said were gays, bisexuals, men who have sex with men or MSMs, and others who engage in unprotected sex and with multiple partners.
Most also of the victims lived in Barangay Calumpang, Lagao, Apopong, Fatima, and Labangal, the city’s biggest and most populous areas. (PNA)
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