AIDS epidemic not going the Africa way, assures govt

NEW DELHI: India may have surpassed South Africa in having the most number of HIV-infected people in the world, but the epidemic is not likely to cause the kind of devastation seen in Africa.
The government is making it clear that the African epidemic has followed a very different trajectory from what has been seen here, largely due to different sexual behaviours.
In Africa as well as in some Western countries, "adult men and women more commonly report a history of extra-marital contact", says Union health secretary J V R Prasada Rao, director-general of ICMR, N K Ganguly, in the authoritative medical journal, Lancet. In India, studies have reported that close to 9% of men and 2% women indulge in extra-marital sex. Although this would be high in terms of numbers, as percentages of a total population, this could be a smaller risk group than some of the African countries, they say.
In some African countries, more than 25% of the population is infected. The average adult HIV prevalence in India is still around 0.5% to 1.5%. At 5.1 million, India not only has the largest number of people infected with HIV, the virus has penetrated into villages, far beyond the reach of existing public health systems. "A high absolute number of HIV-infected individuals does not necessarily indicate that India will follow Africa in epidemic terms," says Rao.
Experts, however, point out that India still needs to be worried. "We have a large population and small increments too may mean large numbers of people," says public health expert, Dr L M Nath. Moreover, he says, "Our systems are not geared to detecting changes in the rural areas. It may well hit us with a bang, especially in the low prevalence states."
International agencies have been voicing concern saying that India will go the African way if the government did not scale up its response. The latest came from the executive director of the Geneva-based Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, Richard Feachem, during a recent visit to India.
Without mincing words, Feachem told the government that India now has the world''s largest number of HIV-infected people, surpassing South Africa. He said India is on "an African trajectory" and called the government''s response "way short of what is necessary to turn around the epidemic."