Opinion - Letters to the Editor   

New perspective

It is heartening to know that there has been a significant downward revision of India’s caseload of people living with HIV (editorial “A new perspective on HIV and AIDS,” June 25). But a lot still needs to be done to effectively contain the virus.

The most important thing to do is to create awareness on AIDS among the people so that discrimination against the HIV-affected can end. That even schools deny admission to HIV-affected children is unfortunate.

Vinod Kumar,
Thiruvananthapuram

It is saddening that even the educated, who are well aware that AIDS does not spread by sitting together or sharing toilets with the affected, discriminate against HIV positive people. It is time we realised that being unwanted is worse than the pain of living with AIDS.

M. Mrinalini,
Ramagundam

The editorial points to what some health analysts have been saying — that the number of HIV infected persons in India has been overestimated over the years. By the early 1990s itself, many studies questioning the estimates were published in the journal of the Voluntary Health Association of India and the National Medical Journal of India. A special issue of the VHAI journal carried several articles endorsing the view in 2003. Yet it t ook the NACO and UNAIDS almost two decades to accept it. Why was a flawed epidemiological perspective, that led to the creation of fear and panic and enhanced the stigma associated with HIV, supported by official organisations? This should be analysed to learn lessons on projecting potential epidemic threats in future.

Ritu Priya,
New Delhi

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