A meeting with members of high-risk group and people living with HIV Positive patients was held at Dr DN Kotnis Health and Education Centre, Salem Tabri, on Saturday.
The meeting was presided over by district AIDS control programme officer US Sooch and senior medical officer (SMO) of ART Centre Gurjeet Singh.
The main motive of the meeting was to discuss the problems being faced by people living with disease and their relatives and family members as well as the people who fall in the high-risk group of contracting the disease.
NGO members also participated in the meeting.
Inderjeet Singh, co-ordinator of the Dr DN Kotnis Health and Education Centre said, “Despite awareness on HIV and AIDS, a social stigma still prevails. It was observed many times that if any person of the society comes to know that a person has AIDS then that person is avoided on every front.”
Targeted Intervention Project manager Upendra Singh informed that soon a memorandum of the demands of patients and their relatives would be framed and submitted to Ludhiana deputy commissioner so that administration can also play some role to solve their problems.”
Sooch said, “The government is running various programmes and schemes to support patients and their relatives. The people are also taking advantage, but still to deal with HIV/AIDS awareness is the best tool.”
{{/usCountry}}Sooch said, “The government is running various programmes and schemes to support patients and their relatives. The people are also taking advantage, but still to deal with HIV/AIDS awareness is the best tool.”
{{/usCountry}}Gurjeet said, “Nearly 5,500 people are taking medicines from ART Centre per month and more than 400 people take medicines from OST centers.”
On the occasion, a core committee was also formed to discuss and solve the problems being faced by the high risk area group members.