Union Minister Mansukh Mandaviya participate at UNAIDS Programme

The Union Minister of State for Shipping (I/C) Mansukh Mandaviya participated in the High-level roundtable of United Nations AIDS (UNAIDS) programme at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland. The theme of the programme is “Access for all: Leveraging Innovations, Investments and Partnerships for Health”. The main objective of the programme is to coordinate global action on the AIDS disease and alleviate its impact. It was established in 1994.

What is UNAIDS?

UNAIDS provides the strategic direction, advocacy, coordination and technical support needed to catalyse and connect leadership from governments, the private sector and communities to deliver life-saving HIV services. UNAIDS is leading the global effort to end AIDS as a public health threat by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals.

Role of India

Government of India is changing the scenario of health-sector, and the policy changes driven by Government for Affordable and Quality Health Access to All. The health needs, technologies and solutions to bridge economic inequalities in the health sector were discussed. The AIDS programme in India is implemented by NACO (National AIDS Control Organization). It formulates policy and implements prevention and control programmes of AIDS in the country. According to UNAIDS India is the third-largest country with the HIV epidemic in the world.

NACO is the nodal organization to implement AIDS programmes of the Indian Government. Apart from this, it also conducts HIV estimation biennially along ICMR (Indian Council of Medical Research). The first round of such estimation was conducted in 1998 and the last was done in 2017.

Important takeaways for all competitive exams:

• World AIDS Day: 1 December.
• United Nations AIDS Headquarters: Geneva, Switzerland.
• Winnie Byanyima is the Executive Director of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS.

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