Sinduja Jane By

CHENNAI: India is estimated to have registered a 66 per cent decline in new HIV infections from 2000 and 32 per cent decline from 2007, according to the latest round of HIV sentinel surveillance and estimations conducted by the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO), released by the Union Health Ministry.

There were around 86,000 new HIV infections in 2015. The report noted that Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, Bihar, Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh currently account for 47 per cent of the number of total new infections among adults with each of these States contributing 7,500 or more new infections in 2015.

West Bengal and Rajasthan registered more than 5,000 new HIV infections, but less than 7,500 new infections, while Maharastra, Odisha and Tamil Nadu have new infections in the range of 3,000-4,000. Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and Punjab have 1,000-2,400 new infections among adults and the rest of the States have less than 1,000 new adult HIV infections in 2015.

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New infections among adults have declined by 50 percent or more in the State of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Manipur and Odisha during 2007-2015. Bihar, Jharkhand, Kerala, Mizoram, Nagaland, Rajasthan and Uttarakhand are the states where annual new infections declined by 32-47 percent during the same period.

However a rising trend in new infections among adults during 2007-2015 has been detected in Assam, Chandigarh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Sikkim, Tripura and Uttar Pradesh.

The report further noted that since 2007, the number of AIDS-related deaths declined by 54 percent in 2015 with an estimated 67,600 people dying of AIDS-related causes nationally.

The annual number of AIDS deaths has declined by 70-81 per cent during 2007-2015 in Karnataka, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu. Annual AIDS related deaths declined by 60-70 percent from baseline values of 2007 in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, Goa, Himachal Pradesh and Nagaland, while a decline of 40-47 percent was estimated in Chhattisgarh, Gujarat and Punjab.