Chandigarh:P Kousalya, President, Positive Womens Network, India shared that we opposed the patent application on syrup nevirapine hemihydrate to ensure that it remains available for our children and to make sure that the government doesnt say it is too expensive to provide and stressed that   Nevirapine is an important anti-retroviral drug, invented in 1989, and was not patentable in India and accessing appropriate paediatric formulations of AIDS drugs have been a particular problem around the world, and we hope that this decision can be a step towards making them more available.

The Indian Patents Act contains some important safeguards designed to ensure that frivolous patent applications are not granted at the cost of public health. These include section 3(d) of the Patents Act, which prevents many new forms of known substances from being patented unless there is a significant improvement in efficacy, and section 3(e) of the Act, which prevents mere admixtures of substances from being patented.

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) _ A new AIDS threat is rising in India's numerous call centers, where young staff are increasingly having unprotected sex with multiple partners in affairs developed during night shifts, a top AIDS expert has warned. While India has made great strides in bringing down its HIV infection rate, the promiscuity among "call center Romeos" is a great concern, Dr. Suniti Solomon, who detected the first HIV case in India in 1986, told an international medical conference Saturday. The United Nations, however, still estimates there are some 2.5 million Indians living with HIV and AIDS now.

"India has reached a plateau of the infections," Solomon told the International Congress on Infectious Diseases, which ends Sunday. Her concern now is the call centers, where many of the young staff work at night to correspond with the daytime working hours of their American and European clients. "They have all the money. They huddle together in the night.They are young, they are sexually active, so naturally they start," Solomon, who runs an AIDS center in the southern city of Chennai, told The Associated Press in a separate interview. She said at least three or four call center workers visit her clinic every week to get tested for HIV because they are worried after having unprotected sex.

It is estimated that India's call centers employ some 1.3 million people, mostly youths fresh out of school and colleges, earning a starting salary of 25,000 rupees (US$600) a month, more than a government doctor's paycheck. "You will see call center Romeos are a major high risk for HIV," Solomon said.

Chandigarh:Last weak Nelson Mandelas charitable organizations launched a global text message fundraising campaign to mark his 90th birthday. The former South African presidents HIV and AIDS charity, 46664 , has set up a premium SMS service in more than 20 countries, allowing people to text happy birthday messages to Mandela. Each sender receives a thank you text in return and a unique PIN, giving them access to thanks by a specially lunched fundraising campaign.

According to the Paper of the Institute of Audiovisual & Telecoms in Europe, " Mobile 2008: Market and Trends" published for the Mobile World Congress 2008, Barcelona: Half of the world population owns a mobile phone. Report says there were 3.18 billion mobile subscribers worldwide at the end of 2007. In 2006 and 2007, developing countries accounted for 90% of the new subscriptions worldwide. Although 70% of mobile subscribers live in developing countries where the mean penetration rate of mobile telephony rose from 13.8% in 2003 to 41.6% in 2007, Its impact on the economic and social structure is tremendous, especially in developing countries where it reduces information disparities between towns and rural areas, and improves interconnection among the people.   Surprisingly HIV and AIDS programmes have failed to make use of it. Now however, a Dutch NGO wants to have this changed.

Despite prevention campaigns, too many young people still die of AIDS every year, putting the economy and the social stability of certain developing countries at risk. Young people being quicker to adopt new technologies are naturally targeted in priority by mobile phone operators. Now a Non-Profit organization located in Amsterdam, Netherlands has embarked on a project to link technology and HIV and AIDS to improve HIV/AIDS education, especially in sub-Saharan countries.

Hyderabad: There has been a steep rise in the number of HIV/AIDS cases in one of India's holiest Hindu pilgrimage sites, the Tirupati-Tirumala hills.

Andhra Pradesh AIDS Control Society has found out that over 200 commercial sex workers operate in the area.

"We have come across this information through unofficial sources that there is commercial sex activity even in Tirumala. There are about 200-300 sex workers there," Project Director, AP AIDS Control Society, K Chandravadan said.

The discovery reveals that sex workers clandestinely operate in about 15 secluded spots in the hills.

Around 150 rural youth ambassadors from ten states gathered at the National Integration Camp here on Sunday to share their experiences of creating awareness on HIV/AIDS among other children.

The programme is an initiative of Nehru Yuva Kendra Sangathan, under the Ministry of Sports and Youth Welfare , Government of India. On this occasion they organized Youth parliament on Sexual Reproductive Health, STI and HIV and AIDS. These children are peer educators - children who themselves learn how HIV/AIDS transmitted and what are the ways to prevent it - and then share that knowledge with other children. They also shared their experience with Dr. Avnish Jolly Resource Person, NYKS on Adolescent and Mr. Umesh Baurai, Project Coordinator, FXB India Suraksha.

The workshop looked at training these Young Ambassadors in four important aspects of the awareness project - how to better their knowledge, how to better their communication with other children, what are the difficulties in teaching other children about HIV/AIDS and how to overcome them. Now under the National policy the resource team stressed upon ABC and step wise and advocates accordingly:

A - Abstinence
B - Be faithful to your partner
C - Use Condom

Legislation criminalises sex between men

In an eye- opener for the ministry of home affairs, a new assessment by the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) reveals that HIV has maximum prevalence among men who have sex with men (MSM).

According to the NACO data, HIV prevalence among MSMs is about 7.4 per cent. It is willing to present the report to the home ministry to draw support for a change in Section 377 of Indian Penal Code, which in its current form, criminalises unnatural sex. This section makes it difficult for non- governmental organisations to work with such men. Interventions such as condoms, to prevent spread of the virus, do not reach most MSMs.

VISAKHAPATNAM: Noted physician in city Padmasri Kootikuppala Surya Rao has lamented that India lost an opportunity to get global funds to control HIV/AIDS due to its failure to send an official delegate to the 2008 high level meeting on AIDS held in New York last week.

Talking to the media persons here on Wednesday, he said that if only the Health Minister or an official of the Government attended the meet held on June 10 and 11, India could have impressed the high level UN meet in which great personalities like former US president Bill Clinton were present, to get some funds for the cause of HIV/AIDS victims in the country, he felt. "I can understand the austerity measures. But you can't have the same yard stick for all things. Had our Health Minister or someone attended it, it would have helped a great deal for AIDS patients here," he stated.

UNITED NATIONS (AFP) - UN chief Ban Ki-moon on Tuesday called for an end to discrimination against people carrying the AIDS virus, including travel restrictions imposed on them by some countries.

"I call for a change in laws that uphold stigma and discrimination, including restrictions on travel for people living with HIV," he said at the opening of a two-day, high-level meeting in the General Assembly on UN targets set in 2001 to roll back the disease worldwide.

"Halting and reversing the spread of AIDS is not only a goal in itself, it is a prerequisite for reaching almost all the others (poverty-reduction Millenium Development Goals by 2015)," he added.

He said that 60 years after the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted, "it is shocking that there should still be discrimination against those at high risk, such as men who have sex with men, or stigma attached to individuals living with HIV."