During a visit to Accra, Ghana, the Executive Director of UNAIDS, Michel Sidibé, met with the President, Nana Akufo-Addo, to encourage his leadership in the regional response to HIV.

Western and central Africa is lagging behind the rest of the continent in advancing progress in the response to HIV and urgently needs to step up efforts to reach the millions of people in need of access to HIV prevention and treatment services.

Mr Sidibé urged the President to make his country a hub of excellence for essential medicines, to which the President underlined his intentions to develop Ghana’s pharmaceutical industry, calling it a “key commitment” and part of his government's “inclusive growth agenda”.

The President expressed his appreciation for the role that UNAIDS has played in leading the AIDS response and said he would champion a revitalised campaign to end mother-to-child transmission of HIV and advance efforts to achieve the 90-90-90 targets—whereby 90% of people living with HIV know their HIV status, 90% of people who know their HIV-positive status are accessing treatment and 90% of people on treatment have suppressed viral loads—particularly among adolescents.