Bill protecting rights of AIDS patients in winter session

Toronto, Aug 15: The government is planning to bring comprehensive legislation to deal with the stigma and discrimination faced by HIV/AIDS patients at workplace and protect their human rights and provide for their care, treatment and support, Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss said today.

Talking to reporters here on the sidelines of the 16th International AIDS Conference here, Dr Ramadoss said the new bill to be presented in the winter session of Parliament would help in reducing the stigma and discrimination for HIV/AIDS patients at workplace and help in protecting their rights with dignity.

The draft of the new HIV/AIDS law had already been prepared by Mr Anand Grover, an eminent lawyer working for the human rights of HIV/AIDS patients, he said and added that comments had been invited and received on the draft law. Now the Health Ministry was deliberating on them and after that it would be sent to the Law Ministry for scrutiny following which it would be brought before the Union Cabinet, the Minister said.

He said legal impediments like section 377 prohibiting men from indulging in homosexuality was being tackled. Though admitting that the new Anti Trafficking Law, being devised by the Women and Child Development Ministry, was not very conducive to the HIV/AIDS control programme, he said various dimensions of the issue were being deliberated to arrive at a sound conclusion.

Stating that the problem of HIV/AIDS among defence and para-military forces was a major cause of concern, Dr Ramadoss said the Health Ministry, along with the Home Ministry, was taking a number of measures to control the spread of HIV/AIDS among para-military forces.

He said the problem of HIV/AIDS has been found to be more acute in North Eastern states and especially among personnel of Assam Rifles. Since injectible drug use was a major source of HIV infection in the region, the government has constituted a Task Force under the Special Secretary in the Home Ministry to deliberate on the Ñ'acceptability and legality of the proposed Needle Exchange programme,Ò' he said.

Under the proposed programme, the government was to provide free needles to the drug users to prevent the spread of infection through use of the same needles, he said.

He said India was focusing on the development of Microbicide and oral drugs for the prevention of HIV/AIDS transmission. Trial was going on a couple of microbicides in Pune in partnership with the Medical Research Council of UK, he said and added that these microbicides were likely to be developed in about three years time.

A pilot project involving female condoms was going on in a population involving 5000 women, he pointed out. However, on the issue of circumcision as a means of reducing HIV infection, he said this was not a priority area as there was no scientific validation of such claims.

The Health Minister said the first phase of the clinical trial of HIV/AIDS vaccine was complete and soon the results would be collated. However, vaccine development was a long process which could take over seven years of time, he added. About the resource generation for the third phase of the National AIDS Control Programme (NACP III), Dr Ramadoss said that of the 2.5 billion dollars to be spent under the programme, the World Bank, DFID, UNAIDS and USAIDS had committed to provide one billion dollars. Other donor agencies like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation would also contribute to the NACP III while the government was going to spend about 5 to 7 million dollars for this ambitious programme to control the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the country.

Under the NACP III, the prevention and treatment for HIV/AIDS would be upscaled and private sector would be involved in a major way in controlling the disease. The HIV/AIDS control programme would be mainstreamed and various ministries and government departments would be involved in the programme, he said.

About the accuracy of HIV/AIDS data, he said that to improve it further, the number of HIV/AIDS sentinel sites would be increased from the present 750 to 1150 with specific focus on states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and those from the North-East region which, though at present, had low prevalence rate but were highly vulnerable.

He said that steps were also being taken to increase the accessibility of Anti Retro Viral drugs for the treatment of HIV/AIDS. At present, ARV treatment was being provided to 35,000 to 40,000 HIV positive people at 54 centres. Their number would soon be increased to 100 centres and the patient coverage would be increased to 85,000, he said.

UNI