New Delhi: The controversy over a United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) report that India has the highest number of HIV/AIDS cases took a new turn on Tuesday with the UN agency claiming the Indian government has accepted its report.
''A minister at the launch of Youth Unite For Victory on AIDS (YUVA) programme on Tuesday said that India has the highest number of HIV/AIDS cases. This indicates that the Indian Government has accepted the UNAIDS report,'' said UNAIDS country representative Denis Braun.
He was referring to Panchayati Raj and Youth Affairs Minister Mani Shanker Aiyar, who, while addressing the YUVA programme launch on Tuesday morning, had apparently said that India has the highest number of HIV/AIDS cases and a movement be launched among youth to fight the disease.
Referring to Union Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss' ''disappointment'' with the UNAIDS report on Global AIDS Epidemic, 2006, released last month, Braun said the Health Minister had reacted ''violently'' and without consulting concerned officials and authorities.
The UNAIDS report stated that India has surpassed South Africa by reporting 5.7 million HIV/AIDS cases, the highest in the world and four lakh deaths due to AIDS in 2005 more than 3.2 lakh of South Africa.
The Health Minister had said that the UNAIDS/WHO was involved in the HIV/AIDS data collection by National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) which put the figure at 5.2 million.
Ramadoss asked why UNAIDS had not consulted the Government while stating that India had 5.7 million HIV/AIDS cases in its report, but Braun denied the charge.
''We relied on the NACO figures for HIV/AIDS which only included the HIV/AIDS infection in the age group of 15-49 years. But we all know that HIV/AIDS infection occurs among children and even those in the age group of above 50. So we had a mathematical derivation which included the figures for these age groups also and arrived at the 5.7 million figure," Braun said.
PAGE_BREAK
''Moreover, we had sent the figure of 5.7 million HIV/AIDS infection to the Minister in March itself. May be he did not get time to go through the issue at that time due to his pre-occupation and busy schedule or did not realise the importance of the issue at that time. So, it is not our fault,'' the UNAIDS representative said.
Braun said the UNAIDS had always cooperated with the Indian Government and ''worked in tandem''. He said the confusion over the HIV/AIDS figures were clear now with the Government ''accepting it''.
However, to clear the matter further, UNAIDS would hold a press conference on the issue jointly with the NACO on June 30, he added.
Comments
0 comment