Traffic Chief,Cheap Jerseys Online, Neil Semple, said that the police will be adopting a more proactive approach to deal with persons who drive under the influence of alcohol.The Traffic Chief was responding to concerns that despite the acquisition of breathalyzers,China Jerseys Wholesale, motorists continue to imbibe alcohol and use the road in a reckless manner, posing severe danger to other road users.Police standard operational procedure is to apply the breathalyzer test to persons following an accident.But according to Semple, the focus will shift to applying the test when the police suspect that a driver might have imbibed alcohol above the prescribed limit.The prescribed limit is below the equivalent of three beers.It was observed that most motorists use the time when there are no traffic ranks on the road to imbibe and then pose a threat to other road users.While figures do not indicate the time of most road accidents and when fatalities occur, it is believed that many motorists are at risk between 02:00 and 05:00 hours.“That is the time when everybody leaves the clubs and by then most of them are drunk. Even senior officials of the government, judges and senior police officers are guilty of this,” one traffic rank observed.The Traffic Chief acknowledged that this state of affairs will require more diligence on the part of the police.“More work is to be done in that area, since we’ve got complaints of persons imbibing in alcohol in the wee hours of the morning and we will be addressing that problem,” Semple said.But with the limited manpower resources available to the police,NFL Jerseys China, this could turn out to a Herculean task.“The strategies that we use in the daytime are ineffective in the nights. For example at nights you cannot use the radar so this is when the breathalysers are most useful, if used in a proactive way,” one traffic rank reasoned.For the first half of this year,Wholesale NFL Jerseys, the number of road accidents and fatalities has decreased when compared with the same period last year.At the end of June last year a total of 48 accidents occurred,Cheap NFL Jerseys China, resulting in the death of 53 persons, among them six children.The statistics show that as of June 30, this year, there was a 10 per cent decrease in the number of road fatalities.Semple said that records show that 48 persons died on the roadways,Cheap Nike NFL Jerseys, including four children.He explained that passengers of public transportation also have a part to play in reducing the number of accidents and fatalities.“Many of them will see and know that a driver had been consuming alcohol and still allow that person to get in the driver’s seat,” he stated.Another bone of contention is the destruction of public property by road users who often get away without sanction.It was observed that most accidents which result in damage to public property occur whenever there is an absence of traffic ranks.In these cases, the errant motorists remove their vehicles before anyone finds out who is responsible.Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee said that the administration is currently working on building capacity within the Guyana Police Force to address the issue.“I hope that one day we will have at each major intersection a car squad. In law enforcement there is no perfect strategy,” the Minister told this newspaper.

–As National Week of Testing gets underwayA total of 30,000 persons are being targeted for the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) testing next month as part of the Ministry of Health’s National AIDS Programme National Week of Testing 2010 programme.National Week of Testing will be observed from November 22 through 26 but will be kicked into motion today with the public testing of Disc Jockeys (DJs) at the National Communications Network (NCN)’s Homestretch Avenue headquarters. The activity is set to commence at 09:00 hours.This year’s Testing Week will be held under the theme “confidential and reliable; get tested now” and will mark the fifth time Guyana will be hosting the activity.According to NAPS’s Voluntary Counselling and Testing (VCT) Coordinator, Mrs Debra Success,China Jerseys Free Shipping, it was just last week that NAPS was able to establish relationships with local DJs. The DJs were represented by Kester Dean.According to Success, it has been discovered that DJs are very important to the testing drive as they are thought to be very influential persons, thus the need to partner with them. And as part of the partnership,Authentic Jerseys From China, Success noted that efforts will be geared at raising awareness about the National Week of Testing activity in order to amplify the need for persons to know their status.“We are hoping that persons will be educated,Wholesale Hockey Jerseys China, sensitised and motivated to utilise the testing sites that will be established in the different administrative regions.”From left: Debra Success, Dr Shanti Singh and Hydar AllyThe VCT Coordinator disclosed that at present there are over 400 testing sites that can be utilised during testing week.In clarifying the purpose of the testing activity, NAPS Programme Manager, Dr Shanti Singh, noted that often it is assumed that VCT is simply about finding HIV positive people.“I want to re-emphasise the point that voluntary counselling and testing while it is about finding positive persons and referring them into a treatment programme it is about ensuring that those people that are negative remain negative.”For this reason, she disclosed that the activity includes a counselling component, which is characterised by pre- and post-test counselling. Some of the issues discussed during these sessions, she revealed, are risk reduction, particularly as it relates to the number of partners an individual has, and correct and consistent condom use for those persons who are HIV negative.“Our mandate here at the Secretariat is really to control the spread of this disease. But for us to control the spread of this disease,Cheap NFL Jerseys Online, particularly important first is how do we reduce new infections?”Dr Singh noted that it must be appreciated that it is because of VCT programmes that new infections have decreased. HIV prevalence, she said, has moved from 2.4 percent in 2005 to about 1.3 percent as at the end of last year.“I think that the voluntary counselling and testing programme was key and instrumental in ensuring that we continue to reduce new infections. Therefore it represents a key programme within our overall gamut of prevention services that we provide.”According to Dr Singh, last year the testing activity had comfortably surpassed the 20,000 targets that were set, thus the expectation that the 30,000 targets this year, which was called for by Minister of Health Dr Leslie Ramsammy,Cheap NFL Jerseys, will be easily exceeded. Close to 29,000 persons were tested last year, an undertaking that Dr Singh regarded as a tremendous amount of work.“We anticipate that this year will be no different…but we look forward to everyone’s participation.”And in living up to the theme there will be certain elements that will be guaranteed during National Week of Testing, according to Dr Singh. Among these, she said, is that of confidentiality, and she insists that quality will not be compromised in anyway.Quality teams will be dispatched to make sure that the services provided with regards to both counselling and testing will be of the same standard as if conducted as a regular VCT sites.At the end of last year just over 85,000 persons were tested through the VCT programme,NFL Jerseys Cheap, Dr Singh revealed.“When you add that to the close to 12,000 testing in the PMTCT programme which is the prevention of mother to child transmission programme and the blood bank screening of blood products we have conducted a little over 100,000 tests for 2009.”Despite all of the tests conducted, Dr Singh said that when the results were received from the Demographic Health Survey, it wa