Jamaica is facing a critical gap in the continuum of HIV care, according to a warning from the AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) Jamaica, which is pushing for immediate intervention to connect more than 13,000 people living with the virus to formally documented treatment.
Latest national epidemiological data compiled in December 2025 puts the total estimated number of people living with HIV across Jamaica at 28,000. Of that group, around 26,500 individuals – 95% of the total estimated population – have already received an HIV diagnosis. However, only 14,716 patients, accounting for just 53% of all people estimated to be living with HIV in the country, are officially recorded as accessing ongoing treatment.
Sannia Sutherland, country programme manager for AHF Jamaica, emphasized that receiving a diagnosis should not be considered the end of the care journey. “With only half of Jamaicans living with HIV on treatment, too many are being left behind,” Sutherland stated. “We have a duty to strengthen every step between diagnosis and treatment, so that everyone diagnosed is brought into care and supported to stay there.”
AHF Jamaica clarified that the gap in documented care does not automatically mean that all patients not captured in official records have stopped taking their antiretroviral medication. Some cases involve patients who have transferred care between different healthcare facilities, while others have continued their treatment regimens without their updated information being added to the national central database.
To close this gap, the organization has put forward two key policy and practice recommendations. First, it is calling for a comprehensive national patient reconciliation audit, which would cross-reference existing treatment records with dispensing data held by the National Health Fund across both public and private healthcare facilities across the country. This matching process would help resolve discrepancies and account for patients who are already receiving treatment but not counted in official statistics, while also identifying those who have fallen out of care entirely.
Second, AHF Jamaica is pushing for targeted support for clinics that see disproportionately high rates of patient disengagement from care. It also recommends that healthcare teams proactively reach out in a timely manner to patients who miss scheduled appointments or stop coming in for treatment, to reconnect them to care rather than writing them off.
The organization did acknowledge the progress that Jamaican government bodies have made in recent years to expand HIV prevention and treatment access, including the planned rollout of long-acting injectable HIV treatment, a new option that offers greater convenience for many patients. Even so, AHF Jamaica stressed that these new treatment options will only deliver limited public health benefits if systemic gaps in connecting and retaining patients in care are not addressed first.
AHF Jamaica is joining forces with the Civil Society Forum to pressure government agencies, healthcare providers, and local community organizations to work together to reach the thousands of patients who are currently missing from documented care. The Civil Society Forum has scheduled a meeting this Friday to move forward with this appeal and outline next steps for collective action.