Thane district is AIDS sensitive area: Survey

THANE: According to a survey conducted by the state government on World AIDS Awareness Day, Thane district is one of the more sensitive HIV positive zones. According to the survey, there are 5,000 HIV positive patients and 9,100 AIDS-affected patients in the district.
The survey says that apart from Thane, Sangli, Chandrapur and Mumbai are the other three AIDS-affected areas.The survey also says that the male female ratio for patients affected is 60:40.
Civic surgeon SM Tompe informed Thane Plus that the number of affected HIV and AIDS patients has been increasing by the day. "There are 5,100 HIV positive patients and 9,122 AIDS patients in the district," he said.
According to reports, the period between January 2009 and October 2009 had 59,070 people testing for HIV. Out of them, 7.1 per cent tested positive. During the previous year surveys, the number of people testing positive was 11.3 per cent, which has shown that Thane district has shown improvement.
"The number of affected pregnant women is also a challenge to the district. In the last 10 months, 1.21 lakh women were tested for HIV and out of them. 722 were affected with the virus. Out of these affected women, we managed to successfully deliver 225 babies," informed Tompe.
The survey also states that there are 5,463 affected patients in Thane city. Out of these, 351 succumbed to the virus, while 42 more patients have been added into the list. The survey was conducted by the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO).
However, the number could be more than what has been given in the survey. This is because the district has been divided into Thane urban and rural. "There is still not much awareness in the rural part of the district and there are chances that there are still several unknown cases," informed a civic doctor on condition of anonymity.