By IANS
New Delhi : In what is good news for India, the number of people living with HIV/AIDS in the country are now estimated at 2.5 million, less than half of what was previously estimated, says a new official survey backed by a United Nations organisation.
The survey, which was released Friday jointly by the UNAIDS, World Health Organisation (WHO) and National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO), the dedicated wing of the Indian health ministry to fight the disease, said that the national adult HIV prevalence in India is between 2 million and 3.1 million.
"We have taken an average of the most accurate prevalence data and underline that India is home to 2.5 million HIV infected people," Anbumani Ramadoss told reporters.
"Experts from India and round the world were consulted and after a lot of hard work and outstanding support from WHO, UNAIDS and other partners, we have been able to arrive at robust figure that all our experts feel is as correct an estimate as we can get.
"The results show that there are an estimated 2 million to 3.1 million people infected with HIV/AIDS with a prevalence level of 0.36 percent," the minister added.
"We are happy with the outcome and hope the country will continue to fight to halt and reverse the HIV epidemic in India," S. Habayeb, WHO India representative, told IANS.
Ramadoss said the estimates are based on mainly two important sources of data.
"First we continue to have the data from our sentinel surveillance, now expanded to 1,122 sites from the earlier 703 sites. This year, we have the additional inputs from the National Family Health Survey, which is a countrywide community based household survey," said Ramadoss.
According to NACO, India earlier was estimated to have a 5.2 million HIV infected population in a country of 1.1 billion people and the UNAIDS last year had even said that the country is home to 5.7 million such people – more than that of South Africa that is believed to have the world's largest number of HIV patients. The Indian government, however, did not buy the UN estimation.
"We think it's a very accurate data. The expanded sentinel surveillance system and the large population based survey conducted in 2005-06 has helped experts to come to this conclusion," said Peter D. Ghys, manager, epidemic and impact monitoring, epidemic monitoring and prevention policy of UNAIDS.
With this revised estimate, India goes down from its second position to the third in the HIV infected country list. While South Africa is at the top of the list, Nigeria has taken over India to occupy the second slot.
UNAIDS also said that In India, HIV epidemic is very different in different regions of the country. Specifically, HIV prevalence is higher in some southern and northeastern states.
"The population based survey (NFHS) represents an entirely new source of data for India and is the first time that it has included an HIV component. The sample size for HIV was over 100,000 people. The type of survey has been conducted in many countries in Africa, where is has been the basis for improving estimates," an UNAIDS statement said.
The body also said that India has greatly expanded its surveillance system in recent years both in terms of number and in terms of population groups covered.
From 155 sites in 1998, India expanded its surveillance to 1,164 sites in 2006, the UN body clarified.