THE ROLE OF THE ORAL HEALTH PROFESSIONALS IN THE MANAGEMENT OF HIV IN GHANA

Abstract

Introduction
In 1981, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) of the United States reported that between October 1980 and May 1981, five young men (all homosexuals) were treated for biopsy-confirmed pneumocystis carinii pneumonia in Los Angeles. The
five patients all had laboratory-confirmed previous or current cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection and oral candidiasis (thrush). On July 4, 1981, the CDC reported that during the previous 30 months, 26 cases of Kaposi Sarcoma had been diagnosed in gay men and eight died  within 24 months of diagnosis. Thus began the history of the virus that causes Acquired Immune Deficiency
Syndrome (AIDS), the Human Immunodeficiency Virus(HIV), which was not discovered until 1983. The infection has since developed into a global epidemic, being transmitted by a multiple range of routes and several countries, particularly those with relatively high
burden, have had to spend a sizable percentage of their health budget to prevent infection and care for people living with HIV.
Epidemiology of HIV in Ghana
According to UNAIDS, data collected from 1990 showed an increase in the HIV prevalence in adults 15-49 years in Ghana from 1.3% in 1990 to a peak of 2.5% in 2001.
The estimated HIV in 2024 was 1.5% and as of late 2025, Ghana has over 334,000 people living with HIV, with approximately 50 new infections recorded each day according to the Ghana AIDS Commission data.