The File Hills Qu’Appelle Tribal Council is concerned about the rising number of HIV/AIDS cases — a subject that will get a lot of attention over the next two days at a health summit it is hosting.
Executive director Gail Boehme says her region recorded 25 cases in 2007 — but by the next year, it was up to 45.
Boehme says Aboriginal women are the hardest hit and many struggle to deal with the situation due to a stigma that goes along with the disease.
She hopes to change this by developing a strategy with participating communities:
“With the intention in mind that we can start to build a plan with the community health directors and with those portfolio councillors and those other experts that are resident in the communities to start to really build a plan that’s reactive and can respond to those needs.”
Saskatchewan has the highest percentange of reported cases of HIV\AIDS in the country.
Boehme notes there were 172 new cases of the disease in the province in 2010 — 125 of those involved people of Aboriginal ancestry.