[india-drug] AIDS epidemic in India

[Sunitha Srinivas <s.srinivas@ru.ac.za>]

(Source:
http://massiveeffort.org/showstory.asp?id=653
Thanks?SS)

India's AIDS epidemic could grow to African levels: activists

India could see an AIDS epidemic similar to that in some African
countries where the disease is the leading cause of death, a study
funded by Microsoft head Bill Gates said Thursday.

The study cited figures from the Indian National AIDS Control
Organisation (NACO) which said 4.58 million Indians were living with
HIV/AIDS at the end of 2002, a significant leap from the figure of 3.97
million given the previous year.

"HIV/AIDS is now spreading to the general populace in India and if
knowledge of the disease, preventive measures and counselling is not
made universal then India could see an epidemic similar to that of some
of the African countries," said a release by the Washington-based
Population Reference Bureau (PRB) which co-authored the study with the
Population Foundation of India (PFI). 

"(In Africa) because adequate efforts were not made to undo the stigma
and discrimination related with HIV/AIDS in the early epidemic stages,
the disease continued to grow silently and today HIV/AIDS is the
leading cause of death in Africa," said Carl Haub, senior demographer
with the PRB.

He said that because of AIDS life expectancy was expected to fall to 30
between 2005 to 2010, while child mortality was already 30-70 percent
higher in some African countries.

India, with a population of more than one billion, has the second
largest number of people living with HIV/AIDS after South Africa, which
has an infected population of around five million out of a total
population of 42 million.

The study was funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which
has pledged 200 million dollars to combat the spread of AIDS in India.

Last year Indian officials accused Gates of "spreading panic" for
endorsing a study that predicted there would be 20-25 million Indians
infected with HIV by 2010.

Haub said the total increase in HIV/AIDS cases worldwide in 2002 was
five million of which India accounted for about 12 percent.

"But I have cause to hope that the situation in India may improve as
India has in fact taken action," he added.

Study co-author A.R. Nanda, who heads the PFI, said the "problem would
have been worse" if the Indian government had not addressed the issue
as soon as the first AIDS case was detected in the southern city of
Madras in 1986.

"But the trends still indicate the need to remove the social stigma
currently associated with HIV/AIDS and ramp up efforts to fight the
disease," said Nanda.

He pointed out that general awareness levels of HIV/AIDS in India was
skewed with villagers displaying "colossal ignorance" about the
disease.

"Three out of four rural women living in the populated states of Bihar,
Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh said they had never heard of HIV/AIDS. And
three out of 10 men were not aware of the condom's protective value,"
said Nanda.

The study said that while 90 percent people living in urban areas had
heard of HIV/AIDS only 72 percent of people in the rural ares had done
so.

At least 85 percent of India's billion-plus people population lives in
villages and small towns.

"Only 100 percent awareness of HIV/AIDS and how it spreads can be an
effective safeguard against the menace... more needs to be done," said
Nanda.





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