********************************************************** SAATHII Electronic Newsletter HIV NEWS FROM INDIA Source: 09/01/2008 Posted on: The Times of India, The Economic Times, The Hindu and The New Indian Express. COMPILED BY: Jacob Boopalan, and L. Ramakrishnan SAATHII Chennai Office. Note: this compilation contains news items about HIV/AIDS published in the Indian media, as well as articles relevant to HIV/AIDS in India published internationally. Articles in this and previous newsletters may also be accessed at http://www.saathii.org/orc/elibrary =============================================================== 1. Surat AIDS workers go gay-hunting The Times of India, January 07, 2008. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Surat_AIDS_workers_go_gay-hunting/articleshow/2679567.cms 2. US likely to increase grants to India for combating AIDS The Economic Times, January 07, 2008. http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Finance/US_to_double_grants_to_India_for_combating_AIDS_Official/articleshow/2680355.cms 3. ?AIDS campaign needs to focus on rural areas? The Hindu, January 08, 2008. http://www.hindu.com/2008/01/08/stories/2008010855230600.htm 4. Centre to provide more care for AIDS victims The New Indian Express, January 08, 2008. http://www.newindpress.com/NewsItems.asp?ID=IET20080108004813&Page=T&Title=Southern+News+-+Tamil+Nadu&Topic=0 =============================================================== 1. Surat AIDS workers go gay-hunting The Times of India, January 07, 2008. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Surat_AIDS_workers_go_gay-hunting/articleshow/2679567.cms SURAT: Guess what hundreds of social workers in the field of HIV, AIDS awareness in the city are working on these days? They are actually learning some of the basic knowledge about how to identify gays. The reason is the nation-wide shift from phase-II of National AIDS Control Programme to phase-III initiated by the National AIDS Control Organisation. In phase-III the core group includes male having sex with male (MSM), sex workers and injecting drug users (IDU) in its phase-III. While most of the non-government organisations have wrapped up their on-going projects citing funds crunch, those who have been permitted to continue their projects are now looking for gays since the trend of injecting drug is not prevalent in Surat. Those who are in the field work maintained that they have no option but to follow the NACP guideline irrespective of whether they are comfortable with it or not. Interestingly, some of the NGOs have actually given up their projects simply it goes against their ideology. "There are some organisations which admitted that they would prefer to back out from such projects. Their argument is that they would not like to directly interact with sex workers or gays instead of target groups including youths." "We have been categorically told to work on core group only with no room for argument, we have started working on gays. Though, we do not have any training to deal with them since all these years we have been dealing with truckers and single male migrants," said a social worker. Earlier, Surat Municipal Corporation's, STD Care had already cited serious repercussions of avoiding migrants in NACP-III saying that the volume of migrant youths approaching them is too high to be ignored. "It is going to be a question of survival for large number of social workers. Many who were holding the position of project officers have already opted for other prospective jobs considering the future of the projects which is hanging in the air at the moment. Those who have either decided to continue or selected by the state aids control society have already started learning the trick of the trade or basics of dealing with gays in other words," said a project officer. =============================================================== 2. US likely to increase grants to India for combating AIDS The Economic Times, January 07, 2008. http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Finance/US_to_double_grants_to_India_for_combating_AIDS_Official/articleshow/2680355.cms CHENNAI: As part of its "ongoing and strong commitment to India" in the fight against the dreaded AIDS, the US would double the quantum of grants to the country, a top official of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HSS) said on Monday. "Our Congress is being asked to double the amount that would be spent on funding India and other countries because the number of cases of HIV is increasing," Mike Leavitt, Secretary, HSS, told reporters after visiting the Government Hospital for Thoracic Medicine at Tambaram Sanatorium here. "Our commitment to India and the Union Ministry of Health is ongoing and strong. As part of President George W Bush's AIDS initiative, US intends to double the money to help India and our other friends to sustain what we are doing, and be helpful in the centres which are carrying out these efforts," Leavitt said. However, he declined to divulge any details on the quantum of the grant. Lauding the hospital, one of the principal beneficiaries of the Indo-US collaborative programme on HIV/AIDS, for its services, Leavitt said Union Health Minister Dr Anbumani Ramadoss intended to replicate the model in other states. "He has done a good job and would like to spread this across India. This is an extraordinarily fine testing centre and clinical delivery system," he said while adding that the US-based Centre for Disease Control, National Institute of Health and the HSS were proud to be part of its development. He also termed as "ravaging" HIV and TB as persons affected with HIV were also prone to TB. =============================================================== 3. ?AIDS campaign needs to focus on rural areas? The Hindu, January 08, 2008. http://www.hindu.com/2008/01/08/stories/2008010855230600.htm CHENNAI: The HIV/AIDS awareness campaign needs to focus more on the rural population, which accounts for 40 per cent of HIV cases, Union Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss said here on Monday. Addressing youth at the launch of a life skills curriculum designed for the Red Ribbon Club at Loyola College, he said the substantial HIV prevalence reported from villages indicated that awareness messages were not reaching rural areas. One of the innovative interventions of the national campaign was the introduction of the Red Ribbon Express, a seven-bogey train, that would take the core messages across the country. Flagged off last month, it would more than 27,000 km, covering 180 stations and 50,000 villages. =============================================================== 4. Centre to provide more care for AIDS victims The New Indian Express, January 08, 2008. http://www.newindpress.com/NewsItems.asp?ID=IET20080108004813&Page=T&Title=Southern+News+-+Tamil+Nadu&Topic=0 TIRUCHY: The Tamil Nadu State AIDS Control Society (TNSACS) has decided to set up a `community care centre? and a `drop-in centre?, funded by the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO), in all the districts to provide additional care for the people afflicted with HIV/AIDS. The community care centre will comprise a medical officer, two nurses, a lab technician and a counsellor and will provide treatment for the HIV positive people afflicted with opportunistic infections such as vomiting and diarrhoea. The centre will be run by a Non-G o v e r n m e n t a l Organisation (NGO), which has a minimum of three year experience in running a 10-bed hospital. It will be opened in a place where the pandemic is reported to have high prevalence in the district. Similarly, the drop-in centre, which will be run with help of the HIV Positive People Network, will have a staff nurse and a pharmacist who, in turn, will refer the patients to ART medical centres after providing first aid. ?There are 18 Integrated Counselling and Testing Centres (ICTCs), known as `Nambikkai Maiyam?, functioning in Tiruchy district to identify the disease and provide counselling to the patients. In addition, the community care centre and the drop-in centre will be set up to provide additional care to the unfortunate lot?, Collector Ashish Vachhani said. At least 12 applications have been received from the NGOs in Tiruchy district expressing willingness to run the community care centre, subsequent to the centralised advertisement published across the State. ?The HIV patients are given medicines worth Rs 700-800 at the District Headquarters Hospital every month besides a highly powerful nutrition package by NACO. The process for identifying the area to set up the community care is under way and the centre will be opened before the end of this month?, he added. =============================================================== Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in the above articles are those of the respective newspapers, not those of SAATHII.