Date:15/09/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/09/15/stories/2008091554900600.htm

Tamil Nadu

Create awareness about AIDS among youth

Staff Reporter

Tirupur: The HIV/AIDS awareness campaigns need to focus more on population aged between 15 and 24 years, which accounts for 40 per cent of new cases in the country, Deputy Director of Health Services V. Vijayalakshmi said here on Sunday. Delivering keynote address at a convention jointly organised by SAVE, USAID and APAC-VHS on ‘control of HIV/AIDS among migrant population’ here, she said that owing to increased awareness, prevalence of Human Immuno-deficiency Virus (HIV) cases in the country had come down from 1 per cent at the start of the millennium to 0.9 per cent in 2005.

She said that though men and women were equally at risk, it was women who were more vulnerable to AIDS.

Villages

Dr. Vijayalakshmi reiterated the need to spread awareness messages more in the mofussils considering the substantial ‘HIV prevalence’ reported from the villages during the last few years.

According to her, the study by World Health Organisation (WHO) in 2006 showed that 2.9 million people affected with AIDS died worldwide that year.

Of them, 2.6 million were adults and rest were children below 15 years.

The Deputy Director said that concerted efforts from different stakeholders were needed to further bring down the HIV prevalence in the state, which was considered among the five high-prevalence states (others being Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Maharastra and Manipur).