2-day conference AIDSCON-6 starts
TNN | Feb 2, 2017, 09.55 AM IST
Representative image
CHANDIGARH: Chandigarh State AIDS Control Society
is organizing two-day conference "AIDSCON-6 --- Toward AIDS Free World
--- on Thursday at Indian Medical Association Complex. Conference will
be inaugurated by governor V P Singh Badnore along with Parimal Rai,
IAS, advisor to administrator UT, Chandigarh, and Anurag Aggarwal, IAS,
home secretary-cum-secretary health, Chandigarh.
The conference is primarily planned as a main stream activity to sensitize and attempt to involve community in AIDS control programme. The objective of the conference is to consolidate all efforts carried out regarding control of HIV/AIDS and bring together all partners on one platform. Since a lot of work has being done by various agencies in this field, it is desirable that there should be some kind of coordination between agencies and exchange of ideas, thoughts and knowledge. AIDSCON will provide an appropriate platform for the same.
Chandigarh State AIDS Control Society is the only AIDS control society in the country that has organized a conference like AIDSCON and has been doing it very successfully for the past five years. This year too, Chandigarh SACS has worked hard to bring together on one platform the service providers, policy makers, researchers, students and beneficiaries. The prevalence of HIV in an area is measured by positivity amongst pregnant women. In Chandigarh, this positivity has reduced from 0.27% in 2008 to 0.11% in 2016. HIV positivity among the general population has also come down from 7.12% in 2008 to 0.81% in 2016.
High risk groups have also been showing a decreasing incidence of HIV new infections. Similarly, sexually transmitted infections have also shown a decline. The prevalence among intravenous drug users continues to be the same as in the past years. At the moment, there are 4,550 patients alive and on ART in the centre at PGIMER. Of these, 578 (12.70%) are from local population. It is important to remember that the patient load in Chandigarh is actually a reflection of the region as states of Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh contribute to the patient load. As PGI is a tertiary health centre, the referred patients reach here usually at a late stage in their disease. This results in larger number of deaths. The number of patients started on the treatment in the ART Centre has been a stable figure since 2012. Another indicator of low prevalence of HIV is the positivity in the blood units collected through voluntary blood donations in blood banks.
The conference is primarily planned as a main stream activity to sensitize and attempt to involve community in AIDS control programme. The objective of the conference is to consolidate all efforts carried out regarding control of HIV/AIDS and bring together all partners on one platform. Since a lot of work has being done by various agencies in this field, it is desirable that there should be some kind of coordination between agencies and exchange of ideas, thoughts and knowledge. AIDSCON will provide an appropriate platform for the same.
Chandigarh State AIDS Control Society is the only AIDS control society in the country that has organized a conference like AIDSCON and has been doing it very successfully for the past five years. This year too, Chandigarh SACS has worked hard to bring together on one platform the service providers, policy makers, researchers, students and beneficiaries. The prevalence of HIV in an area is measured by positivity amongst pregnant women. In Chandigarh, this positivity has reduced from 0.27% in 2008 to 0.11% in 2016. HIV positivity among the general population has also come down from 7.12% in 2008 to 0.81% in 2016.
High risk groups have also been showing a decreasing incidence of HIV new infections. Similarly, sexually transmitted infections have also shown a decline. The prevalence among intravenous drug users continues to be the same as in the past years. At the moment, there are 4,550 patients alive and on ART in the centre at PGIMER. Of these, 578 (12.70%) are from local population. It is important to remember that the patient load in Chandigarh is actually a reflection of the region as states of Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh contribute to the patient load. As PGI is a tertiary health centre, the referred patients reach here usually at a late stage in their disease. This results in larger number of deaths. The number of patients started on the treatment in the ART Centre has been a stable figure since 2012. Another indicator of low prevalence of HIV is the positivity in the blood units collected through voluntary blood donations in blood banks.
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