The U.S. is solidly behind India’s battle against HIV/AIDS and is contributing to the struggle to prevent the spread of this scourge. The State Department on Dec. 14 noted that the financial support Washington is giving to India to fight AIDS was part of the “broad and growing relationship” with that country.

According to some estimates, the second largest number of people living with AIDS is in India. While it is still considered a low-prevalence country with the average infection rate of about 0.8 percent, this translates to a huge number of 4.58 million that are infected.

Looking at the history of the spread of HIV, experts at the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) say that several African countries that had a 0.8 percent infection rate 10 years ago now have double-digit rates of infection, a scary future if India does not move speedily to deal with the spread.

“If the situation in India reaches even 5 percent, it would mean a whopping 35 million people, much more than the total number of people infected in the whole of Africa,” said Dr. Maxine Olson, Resident Representative, UNDP and UN Theme Group Chair on HIV/AIDS, India, writing in the UNDP’s YouandAIDS magazine.

In 2004, the U.S. contributed more than $20 million through President George Bush’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. The U.S. Agency for International Development, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health and other U.S. agencies are working with the Government of India and with non-governmental organizations to share knowledge, research and resources, the State Department announced in a release. “India and the U.S. have been partners in biomedical research and combating diseases for over 35 years,” it said.

The department pointed to a project in Tamil Nadu, where the U.S. has joined forces with the Indian Network of Positive People and the Government Hospital of Thoracic Medicine to convert one wing of the hospital into India’s first Family Counseling Center. It is also working with Pathway in what it says is a pioneering comprehensive, community-based approach to improve the lives of persons infected with HIV/AIDS.