AIDS: India to look beyond numbers

[Guest guest]

AIDS: India to look beyond numbers

Priyanka Pruthi, Monday, June 18, 2007 (New Delhi)

Standing at what the United Nations called ''the tipping point'' in

the trajectory of aids, India was until recently, the country with

the second largest population of HIV+ people at 5.3 million.

AIDS hit India in 1986 and since then it has been a long fight to

halt the epidemic.

Millions of dollars have poured in from international donors, NGOs

and the government for prevention and awareness programmes.

But today, this flow of funds could dry up. New estimates reveal that

the number of people living with HIV could be much smaller than

believed and ironically, activists fear the first casualty would be

aid.

''Funding would be affected at their level. Small NGOs would be at

the receiving end,'' said Kaushalya, Positive Women's Network.

The government on the other hand has no such apprehensions.

''We are going to have a lot of progress on the programme. The funds

won't be cut down, intensity will be increased so that we completely

do away with HIV. Foreign funding is mostly placed on the Global Fund

and the Global Fund has committed to our programmes,'' said Dr

Anbumani Ramadoss, Union Health Minister.

Currently, India spends more than $2.6 billion to fight AIDS, a large

portion of which is funded by international organisations such as

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has donated more than $250 million,

while the Global Fund has put in $492,791,693 over the past five

years.

But the National Aids Control Organisation or NACO has consistently

faced a shortage of funds.

In 2006, the shortfall was $128 million and in 2007, it rose to $170

million.

And though the epidemic could be smaller than before, the measures

being taken to tackle HIV need to be expanded such as testing for TB,

a major cause of deaths in HIV positive patients.

''I see this as a very political disease. This kind of response has

not come from communities in cancer and malaria, even if studies show

that numbers are lesser. Donors can't pull back now. It's opened a

Pandora's box because we are also looking at opportunist infections.

For the first time because of HIV there are health initiatives that

have gone down to the district level,'' said Anjali Gopalan,

Executive Director, Naaz Foundation.

The new estimates would have us believe that AIDS is not

an ''approaching Armageddon'' but as methodologies change, what is

certain - is that it's time for us to look beyond the numbers.

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