The Hindu : Front Page : Prevention can stop spread of HIV

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Aug 16, 2006

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Prevention can stop spread of HIV

Aarti Dhar

Target should be the high-risk groups such as sex workers and their clients: report

TORONTO : South Asia's HIV and AIDS epidemic can be expected to grow rapidly unless the eight countries in the region, especially India, can provide better preventive measures, a recent World Bank report has said.

The target should be the high-risk groups such as sex workers and their clients, injecting drug users and men having sex with men.

The report `AIDS in South Asia: Understanding and Responding to a Heterogeneous Epidemic' said over 5.5 million people were infected with HIV in South Asia with the epidemic increasingly driven by the region's flourishing sex industry and injecting drug use. Contributing regional risk factors include widespread stigma and discrimination, poverty and inequality, illiteracy, low social status of women, trafficking of women, porous borders, migration, cultural restrictions on discussing sex and limited condom use.

Unique patterns

Releasing the report here at the XVI International AIDS Conference, Julian Schweitzer, Director for Human Development in the World Bank's South Asia regional team said the epidemic differed across South Asia and India could even be considered a continent in itself, with individual States and even smaller geographic pockets with unique patterns requiring different HIV responses.

Focussing mainly on the five countries — Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka the report suggested that the countries tailor prevention programmes to suit local conditions.In India, most voluntary groups focused prevention work on migrant men rather than on the one million sex workers.

Lauds India

South Asia's most severe epidemic was in parts of India, particularly in a cluster of southern and western States, including Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Goa and Maharashtra.

Mr. Schweitzer said there was room for complacency. "Importantly, the region is full of conflict and the virus loves conflict and weak governance. Also, India has a disadvantage of being situated between Afghanistan and Myanmar, the two largest producing countries." The World Bank has appreciated India's efforts in checking the spread.

Responding to queries , Sujatha Rao, Director General of the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) said the country's HIV/AIDS prevention strategy was focussed on the high-risk groups.

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