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Paidamoyo Chipunza Senior Health Reporter
Zimbabwe is ready to host the seven-day 18th International Conference on STIs and Aids in Africa (ICASA) that begins on November 29, ICASA director, Mr Luc Bodea has said. Mr Bodea said all key presenters confirmed attendance while the programme abstract book was ready. He said they were happy with the preparatory progress so far given the limited time Zimbabwe had to prepare for the conference.

“Considering the little time that Zimbabwe had to prepare for ICASA, we have so far more than 3 500 registered delegates and we are still updating the registration process,” said Mr Bodea.

He said more than 72 countries were represented and more were still expected. The conference, to be opened by President Mugabe on November 29, is expected to deliberate on three main prongs namely; scientific, leadership and community.

The scientific prong, will see a number of presentations on biomedical advances, elimination of mother to child transmission of HIV, achieving the United Nations targets of ensuring that 90 percent of population know their statuses, 90 percent of those who know their statuses have access to treatment and that at least 90 percent of those on treatment have their viral load suppressed by 2020.