Re: Anniversary of the Sonagachi Project

[Guest guest]

Dear Friends at Durbar,

Please accept my hearty congratulations on the 11th

anniversary of the Sonagachi Project. Your achievements have inspired

many of us who work in HIV/AIDS control in India and elsewhere. I

believe the Sonagachi Project remains the best example of a targetted

intervention among brothel-based sex workers anywhere in the world,

not only because of your spectacular success, but also because of

your humane and participatory approach, resulting in a high degree of

sustainability rarely seen anywhere else.

As highlighted in my editorial in the British Medical

Journal, the HIV prevalence rates among the brothel-based sex workers

of both Sonagachi (Calcutta) and Kamathipura (Bombay) were below 10 %

in the early 1990s. While it stayed below 10 % in Sonagachi even

after a decade, the HIV prevalence rate rose to over 50 % in

Kamathipura, by the year 2000. (Can India avoid being devastated by

HIV? by S. Ramasundaram, in the BMJ, 26 Jan 2002 at

http://bmj.com/cgi/reprint/324/7331/182.pdf )

The main difference between the success in Sonagachi and the

lack of it in Kamathipura is your highly effective STD/HIV

intervention launched in 1992 under the dynamic leadership of Dr.S.

Jana of the All India Institute of Hygiene and Public Health

(jana@...). I recall my visits to Sonagachi over the

past few years to understand the reasons for your spectacular success

in containing the spread of HIV and to draw lessons for other parts

of India where the HIV epidemic continues to grow in the absence of

effective interventions like yours. As Dr. Jana has explained to

several Indian and international audiences, the three " Rs " of the

Sonagachi Project were as important elements as the public health

ones such as STD treatment and condom use. We adopted this approach

in Tamil Nadu with a considerable degree of success. (HIV/AIDS

Control in India - Lessons learned from Tamil Nadu, by S.

Ramasundaram et al : at http://www.cmhealth.org/docs/wg5_paper2.pdf )

Above all, the empowerment of the sex workers over this

period, resulting in the setting up of the USHA Multi-Purpose Co-

operative Society and the sex workers taking over the management of

the Project are very important lessons the whole world can benefit

from. This is one of the best ways to ensure sustainability. I am

sure you would record and appreciate the timely funding of your

Project by many donors over the past 11 years during your anniversary

celebrations later this week. But your most important message to the

world is the way you have demonstrated that sex workers can

themselves manage such an intervention, resulting in the very

effective interruption of HIV transmission which is sustained over

many years.

Though I would very much like to participate in your joyous

celebrations, official commitments at New Delhi make this difficult.

But my best wishes are with you, as always. I am confident that you

will continue your exemplary work so that others in India and

elsewhere can learn how to control the spread of HIV. Please convey

my best wishes to all the sisters at Durbar and your well-wishers who

will be joining you this weekend.

Warm regards;

Ram

S. Ramasundaram, IAS

Joint Secretary

Dept of Commerce

Govt of India

Room 288, Udyog Bhavan

New Delhi-110011

Ph: +91-11-2301-1771

Emails: Off: sundaram@..., Per: ramasundaram@...