Accra, Sept. 2, GNA - A two-day legal literacy training workshop on Tuesday opened in Accra with a call on legal practitioners to challenge and prevent stigmatisation and discrimination against People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA).
"It is sad that the rights of people living with HIV/AIDS are often violated because of their presumed HIV status, causing them to suffer both the burden of the disease and the consequential loss of their rights," Mrs Esther Baah Amoako, Executive Director of AIDS Alert Ghana, an non-governmental organisation, said.
Addressing the 30 legal experts representing Commission for Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), Judiciary, Ghana Law Reform and some private legal practitioners, Mrs Amoako, a lawyer by profession, said respect for human rights was critical to the prevention and successful treatment of HIV/AIDS.
She said the violation of the rights of PLWHA could increase the negative impact of the epidemic because instead of worrying only about the infection, they also have to worry about the further loss of their rights because of their HIV status.
The workshop is the first in a series being embarked upon by AIDS Alert for lawyers to share HIV/AIDS legally related experiences, exchange information that would lead to better coordination and collaboration among lawmakers.
At the end of the workshop, participants are expected to form a network of lawyers that would create a supportive environment for PLWHA. It would also make recommendations to the Ghana AIDS Commission (GAC) to aid policy formulation on the disease.
Mrs Amoako said though there are no AIDS specific laws in Ghana, the Constitution and other international human rights instruments, which Ghana has ratified, guaranteed the right to equal protection before the law and freedom from discrimination on grounds such as race, colour, sex, religion and national or social origin.
She said the 2002 HIV/AIDS situational report of the GAC reveals that efforts aimed at creating a supportive legal, ethical and policy environment constitutes only 32.4 per cent of what is required while that at promoting the rights of PLWHA constitutes 46.4 per cent. She, therefore, called on legal practitioners to intensify their efforts at protecting the rights of such people, who may not even know of such rights since there are many cases of PLWHA being treated badly once people find out about their status.
Participants are being taken through topics including the new Patient Charter, Controversies in HIV, Mandatory Testing, Force Testing, Testing Without Consent and Confidentiality/Disclosure/Partner Notification.
The workshop, which would be repeated for a different batch of participants, would also enhance the capacity of lawyers to deal with legal issues of relevance to HIV/AIDS.
