Awareness campaigns taken up by the Health Department in Visakhapatnam district on HIV have made a visible impact, but the rise in incidence among youngsters has emerged as an area of concern.
As per statistics from the Health Department, tests were conducted for about 63,325 persons between April and October, of which 1,046 tested positive, and of them 90% were in the 15-45 age group.
“For every 100 cases, who had come for general HIV tests, almost 40% were educated youth, students and even teenagers. Many of them confessed that they were scared as they had unprotected sex with multiple partners,” said Additional District Health & Medical Officer (ADMHO) Ramesh.
Earlier, the high-risk group comprised migrant labourers and commercial sex workers. But in the past couple of years, youngsters have been falling prey to unsafe sex. “Easy availability of porn, lack of parental guidance and proper counselling have been a few reasons. Few youngsters also confessed that their parents were not marrying them off till they stood on their own feet, and biological urge was impelling them to indulge in unprotected sex,” said an official who supervises AIDS cases.
According to Dr. Ramesh, the number of HIV-positive pregnant women has also not seen a major decline. Of the 43,869 tested in the last seven months, 53 have tested positive, which is about 0.12 %.
Concerted effort
During 2017-18, it was 0.11 %. This year, of the 56,203 blood samples collected and tested, 84 tested positive, which is about 0.15 %.
District Medical & Health Officer Tirupathi Rao said during 2014-15, the AIDS positivity in general clients was 2.5%, while 2015-16 and 2016-17 it was 2.2%. But during 2017-18, it dropped to 1.95% and this year (2018-19), till October, it is 1.65%.
“There has been a decline in the positive cases in the last couple of years. Awareness camps and new initiatives such as “Thalli Bidda Raksha Programme,” community-based screening, and a few others are being taken up on a massive scale with the help of government,” Dr. Tirupathi Rao said.