NEW DELHI: On the occasion of World AIDS Day, Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare Anupriya Patel on Friday launched the National Strategic Plan 2017-24 and Mission “SAMPARK”, to trace those who are Left to Follow Up and needed to be brought under ART services.
”The National Strategic Plan 2017-24 will pave a roadmap not only for achieving the target of 90:90:90 but also strive along with partners towards fast track strategy of ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030,” she said while addressing a function to mark World AIDS Day, 2017 organised by the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO), Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, here.
Paying tributes to all the lives lost to HIV/AIDS not just in India but globally, she urged all to pledge that no more lives would be lost to HIV. ”Let us all come together and join hands in this fight against HIV so that together we can end the epidemic by 2030,” she added.
About 11.5 lakh People Living with HIV(PLHIVs) are taking free ART through 536 ART centres in the country, she informed. She said it was a big challenge to trace those who are Left to Follow Up and needed to be brought under ART services. With this aim in mind, the Mission “SAMPARK” has been launched, she said.
In this direction, the “Community Based Testing” to take HIV testing closer to those in need, would help in fast-tracking the identification of all who were HIV positive and subsequently linking to ART programme, Ms Patel elaborated.
“The next seven years are, therefore, critical and investments made now will result in substantive gains towards ‘End of AIDS’,”. One of our major focus area is the prevention of dual infection — that is mother to child transmission of HIV and mother to child transmission of syphilis, the Minister said.
Reiterating the commitment to end the epidemic, Ms Patel said the political commitment of Government for an all-inclusive AIDS response was proved by the fact that the long-awaited HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control, Act, 2017 had been enacted.
“This landmark Act is people-centric, progressive in nature and brings in legal sanction to address the discrimination faced by People Living with HIV at various settings,” she said. Now, all who were infected and affected with HIV were legally protected from any social, medical, educational, employment and financial discrimination, she pointed out.
Present at the function were Dr. Preeti Sudan, Secretary (Health), Sanjeeva Kumar, AS & DG (NACO), Alok Saxena, JS (NACO), Dr. Billali Camara, Country Coordinator, UNAIDS and Dr. Benk Henkedam, WHO Country Representative to India.
The event concluded on the note of renewed commitment to the cause of HIV by the government and each partner who had contributed to the successful 25 years of NACO and halting the HIV epidemic in the country, an official statement here said.
(AGENCIES)
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