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Political instability and hiv/aids response in the south west and north west regions of Cameroon: a qualitative study
BACKGROUND: Politically motivated violence and insecurity continue to be a major threat to progress in HIV epidemic control and a significant contributor to health inequality. Despite a decreasing HIV/AIDS disease burden, the Republic of Cameroon in West Africa is experiencing ongoing political inst...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
BioMed Central
2023
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10625251/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37924012 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-023-16994-w |
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author | Mekolle, Julius Enongene Tshimwanga, Katayi Edouard Ongeh, Niba Juste Agbornkwai, Agbor Nyenty Amadeus, Omeichu Agwenam Esa, Ismaela Mekolle, Keshia Ebude Forbinake, Ndung Ako Nkfusai, Claude Ngwayu Atanga, Pascal Nji |
author_facet | Mekolle, Julius Enongene Tshimwanga, Katayi Edouard Ongeh, Niba Juste Agbornkwai, Agbor Nyenty Amadeus, Omeichu Agwenam Esa, Ismaela Mekolle, Keshia Ebude Forbinake, Ndung Ako Nkfusai, Claude Ngwayu Atanga, Pascal Nji |
author_sort | Mekolle, Julius Enongene |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: Politically motivated violence and insecurity continue to be a major threat to progress in HIV epidemic control and a significant contributor to health inequality. Despite a decreasing HIV/AIDS disease burden, the Republic of Cameroon in West Africa is experiencing ongoing political instability in her North and South West Regions. Our study used qualitative methods to better understand key frontline health care providers’ (fHCP) perceptions of the effects of political instability on HIV/AIDS response gains in Cameroon since 2018, as well as lessons learned for overcoming them. METHODS: Between July and August 2022, semi-structured, in-depth key informant interviews involving 10 purposively selected participants were conducted in the two regions. Interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim, coded thematically, and analyzed manually. RESULTS: Six overarching themes emerged from the transcribed key informant interviews. They were as follows: Challenge with access to and availability of health care services (HIV care, commodity supply chain) in the smaller communities; Impact on continuity of treatment; Increased risk of new HIV infections; The socioeconomic impact of the crisis on the quality of life; The impact of the crisis on fHCPs’ physical and mental health and the health system’; and Coping mechanisms. CONCLUSIONS: Frontline healthcare workers have acknowledged the significant impact the current political instability has had in hindering the development and advancement of a successful local response to HIV/AIDS in the two impacted regions of Cameroon. Coordinated efforts must be made to strengthen the health sector in areas such as HIV healthcare decentralization, supply chain, and protecting frontline healthcare workers from political quagmires in order to lessen the impact of the nation’s socio-political crisis on the HIV/AIDS response and, more generally, on the entire health sector. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-10625251 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2023 |
publisher | BioMed Central |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-106252512023-11-05 Political instability and hiv/aids response in the south west and north west regions of Cameroon: a qualitative study Mekolle, Julius Enongene Tshimwanga, Katayi Edouard Ongeh, Niba Juste Agbornkwai, Agbor Nyenty Amadeus, Omeichu Agwenam Esa, Ismaela Mekolle, Keshia Ebude Forbinake, Ndung Ako Nkfusai, Claude Ngwayu Atanga, Pascal Nji BMC Public Health Research BACKGROUND: Politically motivated violence and insecurity continue to be a major threat to progress in HIV epidemic control and a significant contributor to health inequality. Despite a decreasing HIV/AIDS disease burden, the Republic of Cameroon in West Africa is experiencing ongoing political instability in her North and South West Regions. Our study used qualitative methods to better understand key frontline health care providers’ (fHCP) perceptions of the effects of political instability on HIV/AIDS response gains in Cameroon since 2018, as well as lessons learned for overcoming them. METHODS: Between July and August 2022, semi-structured, in-depth key informant interviews involving 10 purposively selected participants were conducted in the two regions. Interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim, coded thematically, and analyzed manually. RESULTS: Six overarching themes emerged from the transcribed key informant interviews. They were as follows: Challenge with access to and availability of health care services (HIV care, commodity supply chain) in the smaller communities; Impact on continuity of treatment; Increased risk of new HIV infections; The socioeconomic impact of the crisis on the quality of life; The impact of the crisis on fHCPs’ physical and mental health and the health system’; and Coping mechanisms. CONCLUSIONS: Frontline healthcare workers have acknowledged the significant impact the current political instability has had in hindering the development and advancement of a successful local response to HIV/AIDS in the two impacted regions of Cameroon. Coordinated efforts must be made to strengthen the health sector in areas such as HIV healthcare decentralization, supply chain, and protecting frontline healthcare workers from political quagmires in order to lessen the impact of the nation’s socio-political crisis on the HIV/AIDS response and, more generally, on the entire health sector. BioMed Central 2023-11-03 /pmc/articles/PMC10625251/ /pubmed/37924012 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-023-16994-w Text en © The Author(s) 2023 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. |
spellingShingle | Research Mekolle, Julius Enongene Tshimwanga, Katayi Edouard Ongeh, Niba Juste Agbornkwai, Agbor Nyenty Amadeus, Omeichu Agwenam Esa, Ismaela Mekolle, Keshia Ebude Forbinake, Ndung Ako Nkfusai, Claude Ngwayu Atanga, Pascal Nji Political instability and hiv/aids response in the south west and north west regions of Cameroon: a qualitative study |
title | Political instability and hiv/aids response in the south west and north west regions of Cameroon: a qualitative study |
title_full | Political instability and hiv/aids response in the south west and north west regions of Cameroon: a qualitative study |
title_fullStr | Political instability and hiv/aids response in the south west and north west regions of Cameroon: a qualitative study |
title_full_unstemmed | Political instability and hiv/aids response in the south west and north west regions of Cameroon: a qualitative study |
title_short | Political instability and hiv/aids response in the south west and north west regions of Cameroon: a qualitative study |
title_sort | political instability and hiv/aids response in the south west and north west regions of cameroon: a qualitative study |
topic | Research |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10625251/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37924012 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-023-16994-w |
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