India's HIV/AIDS infections may be less than first thought

Debate has arisen over the true number of HIV/AIDS numbers in India.

According to the UN current estimates, India has 5.7 million people with the HIV virus, the highest number in the world; but now a leading AIDS worker says those figures are greatly exaggerated.

Ashok Alexander, of the anti-AIDS Avahan organisation says the latest figures which are soon to be released, could be as low as three million.

Experts suggest any discrepancy between 5.7 million and three million could only be explained by errors in the methods of calculating the numbers of people with the HIV virus.

Increased funding from the government and from international donors means India is about to embark on a new and expanded phase of its AIDS control programme while officials say the virus is spreading to low-risk groups.

Mr Alexander says a new population-based study, partly funded by the United States was likely to be more accurate because they came from pre-natal clinics, high risk groups and from the government's National Family Health Survey which is a far more accurate way of collating the figures than previous estimates which only relied on details provided by pre-natal clinics.

The new data, called the National Family Health Survey, which took blood samples of 102,000 people from across the country, showed India had fewer cases than first thought.

Recently health officials in India voiced their alarm at the growing numbers of pregnant women infected with HIV/AIDS in the northern states of Uttar Pradesh (UP) and Bihar who are among India's most backward, with huge populations, poor literacy and poor health services.

Workers from UP who migrate to cities in search of work then bring the infection back with them and health workers say unless the state governments make serious attempts to tackle the disease, an AIDS epidemic is a possibility.