President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. recently erred in saying the Philippines has the “second highest” infection rate of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) in the world.
STATEMENT
Asked why he has not appointed a secretary for the Department of Health (DOH), Marcos Jr. said during a Sept. 13 interview with actress and television host Toni Gonzaga that the agency is “not about COVID[-19] alone” but “public health in general.”
He then went on to enumerate other public health issues, such as the rising cases of dengue and the HIV epidemic, saying:
“We have the second highest HIV rate of infection in the world.”
Source: Toni Gonzaga Studio, An Exclusive Interview with President Ferdinand Bongbong Marcos Jr. | Toni Talks, Sept. 13, 2022, watch from 28:41 to 28:46
The video of Marcos Jr.’s interview with Gonzaga has garnered 3.24 million views on YouTube as of Sept. 20.
Based on social media monitoring tool CrowdTangle, the interview has also circulated on at least 82 Facebook (FB) pages, including the official page of Toni Gonzaga, with a potential reach of 550,000 followers. At least 127 Twitter accounts, including the official account of Paul Soriano with more than 187,000 followers, posted the video.
FACT
Marcos Jr. did not specify what he meant by “infection rate.” But the World Health Organization (WHO) data as of July 2022 show that the Philippines does not have the second highest prevalence of HIV infections in the world.
“The highest rates are in sub-Saharan Africa,” said Michel Beusenberg, information officer of the HIV/HEP/STI department at the WHO.
He explained that prevalence rates represent the percentage of the population living with HIV among adults between 15 and 49 years old, while new HIV infections include the rate per 1,000 uninfected population.
The Philippines is among the countries with the highest new HIV infections in the Western Pacific region, estimated from 2010 to 2021. View the data in this infographic:
In an email to VERA Files Fact Check, Noel Palaypayon, supervising health program officer at the National HIV/AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Infections (STI) Surveillance and Strategic Information Unit of the DOH Epidemiology Bureau, noted that “HIV infection rate is not necessarily the same as new HIV infections, but the two are closely related.”
Palaypayon explained:
“While it is true that the Philippines currently does not have the highest number of annual new HIV infections in terms of counts (which are also affected by the population size where, compared to other countries, is smaller in the Philippines), the rate of increase in the annual new HIV infections is what sets the Philippines as one of the countries with highest HIV epidemics among the [key population].”
The United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) identified five main key population groups “vulnerable to HIV and frequently lack adequate access to services.” These include gay men and other men who have sex with men, sex workers, transgender people, people who inject drugs, and prisoners and other incarcerated people.
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Sources
Toni Gonzaga Studio, An Exclusive Interview with President Ferdinand Bongbong Marcos Jr. | Toni Talks, Sept. 13, 2022
World Health Organization, Number of new HIV infections, updated on July 20, 2022
Noel Palaypayon, Personal communication (email), Sept. 19, 2022
Michel Beusenberg, Personal communication (email), Sept. 20, 2022
UNAIDS, In Danger: UNAIDS Global AIDS Update 2022, accessed Sept. 19, 2022
(Guided by the code of principles of the International Fact-Checking Network at Poynter, VERA Files tracks the false claims, flip-flops, misleading statements of public officials and figures, and debunks them with factual evidence. Find out more about this initiative and our methodology.)
