The Sindh government has extended the 'Sindh AIDS Control Program (SACP)' for one year after completion of the PC-1 period of three years, said Monitoring and Alleviation Officer of the programme, Dr Aftab Ahmed, on Thursday. He said that the provincial government had extended the AIDS Control Program up to June 2015, while PC-1 of further three-year extension from 2014 to 2017 had been forward to the authorities concerned for approval.
He said the programme had brought positive changes in society, as the centre had started to receive hidden cases of HIV/AIDS. He said that around 761 HIV positive cases had so far been reported in the year 2014. Dr Aftab said that the AIDS Program was launched in 1995 and had so far registered 3,142 HIV/AIDS positive cases, out of them 1,233 HIV positive patients were provided treatment in the centres. He said that major high risk groups of HIV/AIDS prevalence included long-distance truck drivers, female sex workers, transgender sex workers, men having sex with men (MSMs), injecting drug users (IDUs), jail inmates, children born to infected parents, street children and victims of unsafe medical procedures.
Dr Aftab explained that HIV virus took five to ten years to transform into AIDS. He said that the AIDS Program had expended the circle of diagnostic centres throughout the Sindh province and currently five centres had been providing treatment and diagnostic facilities in the province.