World Bank provides 250 million dollars to support Indias AIDS control program

A World Bank credit of 250 million dollars for the Third National HIV/AIDS Control Project was signed on Thursday here.

New Delhi, July 6 : A World Bank credit of 250 million dollars for the Third National HIV/AIDS Control Project was signed on Thursday here.

The signatories of the agreement were Madhusudan Prasad, Joint Secretary, Department of Economic Affairs, who signed on behalf of Government of India, and Isabel Guerrero, Country Director, India for the World Bank. The Third National HIV/AIDS Control Project will support the Government's efforts to prevent the spread and mitigate the impact of HIV/AIDS in the country by assisting in improving prevention programs, and amplifying care, support, and treatment of people living with HIV and AIDS across the country.

"India has one of the largest numbers of HIV infected populations anywhere in the world. Although our prevalence rate is low, we remain acutely at risk of a growing epidemic. Therefore the focus of the third phase of the NACP remains squarely on prevention while it also ensures that those requiring treatment are not denied", said Sujatha Rao, Additional Secretary and Director General, National AIDS Control Organization.

The Government of India has embarked on an ambitious goal of halting and reversing the HIV/AIDS epidemic by 2011, ahead of the 2015 target of the 6th MDG. It has developed and enhanced its response to the epidemic over the last two decades.

This sustained commitment has yielded many benefits, including increased numbers of voluntary counseling and testing centers for HIV and clinics to treat sexually transmitted diseases, special interventions among groups at highest risk of HIV, supporting an effective blood safety program, establishment of prevention of parent to child transmission services, and care, support and treatment services for people living with HIV.

"Despite these impressive achievements, HIV and AIDS remains a serious threat to India's health gains as well as its economic growth," said Isabel Guerrero, World Bank Country Director for India.

"While the disease is concentrated among high risk groups (sex workers, men who have sex with men and injecting drug users), increasing HIV prevalence among women and in rural areas points to generalized epidemics in some states. This project will help the government continue scaling up prevention, care, support and treatment interventions nationwide," she added.

With 99 percent of the population still uninfected, prevention is the top priority of the project. The project aims to reach 80 percent of high-risk groups namely men who have sex with men, injecting drug users and commercial sex workers; over a five-year period. It will also support scaling up of interventions in highly vulnerable sub-sections of society such as long distance truckers and short duration migrant workers who often carry infection back to homes in villages.

India is also discovering the visible face of the epidemic with a significant number of people living with HIV and AIDS. Hence providing treatment, care and support to people living with the disease is a key component of the project.

NACP began providing free anti-retroviral therapy (ART) in high prevalence states in April 2004 and now has over 80,000 persons on treatment. It is estimated that during the project period, care and support services will be provided to 380,000 people living with HIV and AIDS; and ART to 340,000 persons, 40,000 of which are children.

The project also aims to undertake strengthening and skills development within NACO, the State AIDS Control Societies and of NGOs associated with the program to better carry out the task of instituting good quality, greatly scaled up interventions in Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and mainstreaming a response to HIV through other ministries and the private sector.

NACP III is also supported by a GBP 102 million Grant from DFID(British Department for International Development), a USD 214 million Grant from the Global Fund against AIDS, TB and Malaria (GFATM) and a 50 million dollar grant from USAID.

ANI