As the world observes AIDS Day on Friday, experts here have cautioned the Government to not to be complacent as rising incidence trends in some areas and population pockets — Assam, Chandigarh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Sikkim, Tripura and Uttar Pradesh — remain the cause of concern.
They also expressed concern that the epidemic was no longer declining at the same rate as it was earlier. “While on average AIDS-related mortality declined annually by 9.3 per cent in 2001-2005, 7.4 per cent in 2006-2010, the decline was 3.4 per cent in 2011-2015,” said the researchers who had conducted detailed analysis of the country’s 2015 HIV Estimates generated by a UNAIDS tool.
“If a ‘business as usual’ approach is maintained, declines in AIDS-related mortality may continue at an annual rate of 3.4 per cent. Similarly, without introducing programmatic innovations and scaling up or at least sustaining prevention efforts, new HIV infections will decline only by roughly 50 per cent by 2030,” said the researchers in the analysis published in the latest edition of the Indian Journal Medical Research (IJMR) of the Department of Health Research (DHR) under the Union Health Ministry. The researchers team included Arvind Pandey, Jitenkumar Singh and Padum Narayan from ICMR-National Institute of Medical Statistics, Neeraj Dhingra (NACO), Sashi Kant(AIIMS) laxmikant Chavan (WHO), Taoufik Bakkali and Savina Ammassari (UNAIDS) among others.
India’s national adult prevalence of HIV was 0.26 per cent in 2015. Of the 2.1 million people living with HIV/AIDS, the largest cohort was in Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Karnataka. New HIV infections were an estimated 86,000 in 2015, reflecting a decline by around 32 per cent from 2007. The declining trend in incidence was mirrored in most States, though an increasing trend was detected in Assam, Chandigarh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Sikkim, Tripura and Uttar Pradesh, noted the researchers. AIDS-related deaths were estimated to be 67,600 in 2015, reflecting a 54 per cent decline from 2007. However, there were variations in the rate and trend of decline across India for this indicator also.
While HIV prevalence in most of the States and Union Territories, including the former high prevalence States of Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Manipur and Nagaland, either declined or remained stable in other States such as Assam, Delhi, Jharkhand, Punjab, Haryana, Tripura and Uttarakhand, it rose from 2007 to 2015.
Regarding the volume of HIV infections, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana (394,700), Maharashtra (301,500), Karnataka (199,100) and Gujarat (166,300) had the largest number of PlHIV in 2015. The new estimates also showed that the epidemic was no longer declining at the same rate as it was earlier. While new HIV infections reduced at a high rate by overall 66 per cent in 2000-2015, the annual rate of decline was slow, especially since 2011, said the report.