Kalam asks MPs make law to prevent stigma associated with HIV/AIDS

New Delhi, Dec 1 (UNI) President A P J Abdul Kalam today called for a ''robust and effective'' legislation to prevent the stigma and discrimination being faced by HIV/AIDS patients in the country.

Dr Kalam also exhorted the MPs to take up control and prevention of HIV/AIDS in their respective constituencies as a ''Mission''.

Addressing members of both houses of Parliament here on the occasion of the World AIDS Day, the President stressed the need for bringing down the existing prohibitive cost of HIV/AIDS medicine to make it available to needy patients.

He also cautioned the members of Parliament to take steps to prevent contamination of blood and called for expediting development of HIV/AIDS vaccine and develping rapid HIV/AIDS detection kits.

Citing two incidents of HIV/AIDS infected children and women facing social ostracism and denied school admission, he said the MPs could play a crucial role in preventing stigma attached to the HIV positive persons in their constituencies.

He urged the MPs to make it an important mission to prevent and control the dreaded disease in their constituencies within next five years.

Terming HIV/AIDS ''silent killer'' with 5.7 million positive people, Dr Kalam said efforts for generating awareness among the masses for removing the stigma attached to the dreaded disease and make availability of medicines to control HIV at different phases of the disease.

Pointing out that rural youth and women constitute a majority of HIV/AIDS infected people, he said that MPs could launch an organised awareness campaign among these groups in their constituencies.

''MPs can take up the discrimination issues with local administration, panchayat authorities and NGOs working in the districts or blocks and create a movement so that the stigma and discrimination among the affected people is totally removed in a time-bound manner,'' he said.

The President said that by bringing down the prohibitive cost of medicines to make it affordable to needy patients was crucial so that infections could be controlled and life of patients extended.

He stressed the need for national laboratories to develop cost effective, diagnostic tool for HIV. Pointing out one such NEVA-HIV kit developed by Delhi University and Cadilla Pharmaceuticals Ltd could detect HIV/AIDS from a blood sample within three minutes.

Dr Kalam said such single step, easy to use testing kits should be introduced in all public health centres at the earliest.

He stressed the need for developing and producing an effective anti-HIV vaccine to prevent further spread of the disease. Pointing out the trial of two anti-HIV vaccines being carried out in the country, he said it has to be completed with a time-bound mission mode.

He said it was also essential to take up a third fully indigenous anti-HIV programme as a collaborative work between Indian R and D institutions including traditional medicine systems.

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