Flexibility cuts HIV in India

Aradhana Johri, Chief of India’s National AIDS Control Organisaiton, told the Asia and the Pacific AIDS Congress their first concern was to understand the disease to know what was happening.

“When we found intravenous drug-users were driving the epidemic, we were able to address them. Today we know migration is the drive, and we trying to address that before it assumes epidemic proportions. “So it’s important to have a flexible policy that can be revised on the basis of emerging data,” she said as a lesson for countries like Bangladesh that are yet to cut down on new infections. She, however, added that "no prescription can be given from outside" and that the solution "has to come from within". The mega AIDS conference brought together more than 3,000 participants from 80 countries in the Asia-Pacific region. Being home to the world’s third largest number of HIV people, India accounts for 40 percent of the total regional numbers. But the already low-prevalence is declining, and now it is 0.27 percent. Johri said they engaged people from all levels in the government-led programme to yield the maximum benefit. The country's next five-year AIDS control plan was prepared after a six-month discussion with thousands of stakeholders, 60 percent of them out of the government sector. “So we have targeted interventions reaching out to communities. It's peer-led and run by the communities and NGOs." And that, she said, could prevent the estimated three million new infections in as many decades. She said that in order to maintain low-prevalence, they stressed prevention. “Otherwise, normally, treatment takes up everything else. But our prevention focus is balanced mix of prevention and treatment." She the Indian government had pumped in additional resources when international funding for HIV combat shrank. Funding rose to 66 percent from 12 percent for the five-year HIV/AIDS control programme. . “We are fortunate we have political leadership that has led us from the front.” Replying a question she said India and Bangladesh could work together because of cross-border migration between the two neighbours. “Many counties in the region have the issue of migration. So, the governments have to work together,” she said. But, in India, internal migration also posed a problem, she said. The conference discussed the ways to reduce new infections and achieving a series of zeros - zero new infection, zero AIDS deaths, and zero stigma and discrimination.