Controlling HIV a social duty: Minister

Thiruvananthapuram: Steps to control HIV virus should be seen as a social responsibility, said health minister K K Shailaja. “We have already initiated a project which will hopefully control the number of HIV patients,” said the minister while inaugurating the World Aids Day observance here on Saturday.
Referring to a recent report on the Nipah virus outbreak in May-June which differed on the number of deaths due to the infection from the official toll, the minister said there was no confusion. “Kerala was the only state which successfully defended the outbreak. Those who have read the medical report on Nipah would clearly understand that statistics presented by the government was accurate.”

As per the official records, there are only 18 confirmed cases including the index case and 16 deaths. Recently, there was a confusion on the toll following the publication of a research paper in an international journal which also included four probable cases which were not confirmed by tests.

Shailaja praised the efforts of the health department who successfully found the virus by the time the second death was reported. “We identified the virus and initiated effective countermeasures which proved vital in controlling the outbreak. Patients who showed identical symptoms to the deceased were checked and their blood samples collected. Of the 18, who showed similar symptoms initially, 16 died but we were able to save two people.” She further added that there was no point in saying that sending samples prior to confirming the disease would have made significant changes. “Even the sample taken from a person, who lost four members to the virus, showed negative. So, saying things would’ve been different if we had sent in the samples earlier is pointless,” she argued.

MLA V S Sivakumar presided over the ceremony. Aids Control Society project director R Ramesh, district control officer Sindhu and University College principal J Anilkumar also spoke.