Delhi Declaration on AIDS

[Guest guest]

Delhi Declaration to wage war on AIDS

The Statesman 13 May, 2002

NEW DELHI, May 12. – The Indian Council of Medical Research, the National AIDS

Control Organisation and the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative, a voluntary

group, today signed a joint declaration to fight HIV/AIDS. The 15-point agenda,

known as “Delhi Declaration”, will be presented to Mr. Vajpayee tomorrow.

Various government and non-government groups discussed ways to address the

killer disease for the past two days. Representatives from countries like

Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda, Brazil, Thailand, Nepal and South Africa participated in

the deliberations. The initiative is also supported by the World Health

Organisation, the World Bank and the UN-AIDS.

The joint declaration said the organisation working for HIV/AIDS patients across

the world “pledge to provide leadership and take concrete steps to address the

complexities of the challenges presented by the epidemic, building on the UN

Declaration of commitment on HIV/AIDS and other international, regional and

national agreements.”

The declaration said the primary objective of these groups was to inform and

educate patients and their families about the disease. The organisations will

decide on a strategy after taking affected people into confidence to fight the

menace. They also pledged to work for development of a possible vaccine. The

declaration said with the alarming increase in number of HIV/AIDS patients, the

government and social organisations had all the more reasons to fight the

disease on a war footing.

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Dr.Jagdish Harsh ( jharsh@... )

Director of Administration and Operations

François-Xavier Bagnoud INDIA ( www.fxb.org )

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