Nyamira residents have been urged to consider going for regular HIV/Aids testing to know their status.
Mrs Naomi Nyagarama said it was important for all residents to know their status so that they can avoid unnecessary transmission of the virus.
She said many residents were not aware of their status, with a number of clinics reporting just a few people going for voluntary and counselling tests.
“I am really disappointed that most of us never go for voluntary testing and counseling. I have gone through the statistics of the attendees and the figure is wanting. This is a county of over 500,000 people yet we can’t even record 20,000 people going for VCT in a single month in both private and government clinics,” she said on Thursday at Mosobeti.
She said the pandemic was likely to spread at a faster rate if people continued to ignore calls to know their status.
“Not all times people use contraceptives. Some are very ignorant so it’s important you know your status so that we reduce cases of infections,” she said.
She challenged the youthful population to abstain from premarital sex as a way of combating the HIV menace which is said to be escalating in the former Nyanza province.
“The Ministry of Health released statistics of those infected and the former Nyanza province where Nyamira is part of it was among the leading. It’s now a wake up call for the youth to abstain from premarital sex and sex with more than one partner when married. This is the only way out for us,” said the county governor's wife.