NATIONAL AIDS PREVENTION AND CONTROL POLICY

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Dear Forum subscribers,

The latest National AIDS Prevention and Control Policy is posted on

the NACO webpage.

http://naco.nic.in/vsnaco/nacp/ctrlpol.htm

The following is the introduction of the policy document.

Moderator

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1. INTRODUCTION

1.1 In India the Human Immunodeficiency Virus/ Acquired

Immunodeficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS) epidemic is now 15 years old.

Within this short period it has emerged as one of the most serious

public health problems in the country. The initial cases of HIV/AIDS

were reported among commercial sex workers in Mumbai and Chennai and

injecting drug users in the north-eastern State of Manipur . The

infection has since then spread rapidly in the areas adjoining these

epicenters and by 1996 Maharashtra , Tamil Nadu and Manipur together

accounted for 77 per cent of the total AIDS cases with Maharashtra

reporting almost half the number of cases in the country. Even though

the officially reported cases of HIV infections and full-blown AIDS

cases are in thousands only, it was realised that there is a wide gap

between the reported and estimated figures because of the absence of

epidemiological data in major parts of the country. The latest

estimate for the HIV/AIDS infected adult population in the country is

3.8 million in 2000. The overall prevalence in the country is still,

however, very low, a rate much lower than many other countries in the

Asia region.

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