HIV/AIDS Statistics in India are graphed according to 's Law

[Guest guest]

Dear FORUM,

HIV/AIDS Statistics in India are graphed according to 's Law - always

draw the graph before plotting the points.

My father used to say you can kid as many people as you like but never kid

yourself.

This is the message I am trying to take to the various infected people in

affected communities in the places where I am invited.

I have only been to M.P. once but in that time I met with agencies from Bhopal,

Indore, Ujjain, and places to the south near Khandwa, Chindwara together with an

area that I already knew because of the high level of violence against sexual

minorities, namely Jabalpur.

From the information I gained it seemed that the epicentres of infection were

Ujjain, Indore and Jabalpur and when I last said that all hell broke loose from

the expat Indians around the world but not in India.

Now in the north of the State in Gwalior and the Chambal cases are emerging too

that don't seem to register on the HIV radar.

Well my friend it is a problem in Jaipur and it is not very far from there to

the territory where you are having the care centres.

HIV/AIDS thrives on neglect and ignorance. We have the capacity to be smarter in

India if we want to but unfortunately there are many who say " I can't see it so

its not there and that's the end of it "

Well unfortunately it is difficult to see and when it is in its invisible stage

it is the most potent and the most infectious.

We know however what the precautions are. It can be stopped if more people

learned risk management strategies but I suspect it will take a lot more

infected people in the families of those that are responsible decision makers

in the Indian political system, before alarm bells will start ringing.

I have modified my practice now. My present tasks are to find appropriate peers

in communities who are interested in community health and try to engage them in

best practice education which doesn't require lots of money or 4 wheel drives or

men in white coats backed up by Police officers doing " surveillance work " .

If treatment centres were established and privacy concerns were addressed; if

competent medical treatment was available and laws actioned against

discrimination, people would be keen to establish their status.

Why is HIV not a notifiable disease? and if it was how trusting would the health

consumers be in seeking a test to determine their status I am absolutely sure

that any effort to make it notifiable would be met with howls of protest simply

because some of the higher caste indians who know their status work very hard to

make sure no one else does and they access treatment independently of the

pathetic roll out efforts which cover 0.0042% of those presently known and

infected Indians who will die without the medicine.

You are all considered low prevalence which is what all of India was once.

Unfortunately that low prevalence only happened by accident; It needs good

design to ensure it stays that way.

Fortunately for India there are grass roots agencies attempting to do the work.

It should be a bipartisan effort but already HIV statistics and the useless

arguments about accuracy of numbers is now making it a political football again.

I am doing some exciting work in other parts of Asia right now but I hope to be

back to India again to pick up where I left off during the time of the Tsunami

and get back into M.P. to reconnect with the agencies there.

I was informed by my host agency INP+, headquartered in Chennai, that the

contacts I referred to them last December has resulted in an invitation to

establish some focus groups and assist local agencies to access whatever they

need to be able to make a difference in one part of M.P. and hopefully that will

create a catalyst for more community based action.

If the folks at Gwalior are interested in being a part of the network please

send an email and I will try to establish some useful contacts.

It is frustrating some times but I am compelled when I get frustrated to

remember the motto of alcoholics anonymous - God give me the serenity to accept

the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom

to know the difference.

I am sure that as an intersecting State with transport and migratory traffic

from higher prevalence states passing through on an hourly basis the time is now

to get some ideas around best practice, not to try and stop the main route of

disease transmission which as we know is sexual, but to ensure that people are

skilled enough to know how to prevent both sexually transmitted infections and

of course unwanted pregnancies.

Bye for now. Packing to go to ICAAP.

Geoffrey

E-mail: <gheaviside@...>