The Covid-19 pandemic has already started showing adverse ripple effects on India’s AIDS response with a study by the ICMR warning that the Government may miss the national target to end the deadly disease by 2030. That target would be difficult to achieve as the decline in annual new HIV infections was only 27 per cent from 2010 to 2017 against a national target of a 75% decline by 2020.
The warning comes in a study by the ICMR-National Institute of Medical Statistics, Division of Strategic information — Surveillance and Epidemiology, and the National AIDS Control Organization under the Union Health Ministry.
As per the study published in the latest issue of the Indian Journal of Medical Research, the national adult prevalence of HIV was estimated to be 0.22 per cent in 2017. Mizoram, Manipur and Nagaland had the highest prevalence of over 1 per cent.
The study found an estimated 2.1 million people were living with the AIDS virus, HIV, in 2017, with Maharashtra estimated to have the highest number. Of the 88,000 annual new HIV infections nationally in 2017, Telangana accounted for the largest share.
“HIV incidence was found to be higher among key population groups, especially people who inject drugs. The annual AIDS-related deaths were estimated to be 69,000 nationally," the study said. “...At the sub-national level some states have made better progress to reduce new HIV infection. It calls for reinforcement of HIV prevention, diagnosis and treatment efforts by geographical regions and population groups."
The States with the highest number of people living with HIV in 2017 were Maharashtra (0.33 million), Andhra Pradesh (0.27 million) and Karnataka (0.24 million). Telangana, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar had between 0.2 and 0.1 million such patients.
The study highlighted that prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) of HIV is another critical target to be achieved by 2020. Of the 22,677 such cases in India, 58.2 per cent were on treatment as of December 2018. Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh and Telangana had relatively higher PMTCT need. However, treatment coverage was still significantly lower than the national average.
It also dwelled on 15 states accounting for 87 per cent of the total population of HIV-infected persons in 2017. There were signs of rising new HIV infections in the low-burden states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Mizoram, Meghalaya and Uttarakhand in 2017 compared with 2010, the study pointed out.