Leadership Council

Happy New Year to you all.

As 2007 starts we at SAHAYA are gearing up to announce the Leadership Council (LC) and begin our challenging chapter in the fight against AIDS. The response to the launch has been very positive and we have received a great number of nominations for the LC. This core group will now decide and lead SAHAYA to it's next level and we at AIF, will provide all the technical guidance and resources to steer towards our program goals and objectives. When SAHAYA was launched, one such program priority was spelt out-Prevention of mother to child transmission of HIV/AIDS. This is one way to stop a new generation of infections. We hope that the LC will bring in creative ideas and fresh perspectives in the combat of this deadly virus.

The below article is about an event in India that is being organized to spread awareness about the epidemic. We hope SAHAYA will lead one such mass campaign in 2007-08. Here's wishing everyone a healthy new year and please join SAHAYA - Youth against AIDS today.

Jazz legends to lead fight against AIDS
NEW DELHI: Two of the world's best known jazz artists will join the planet's fight against AIDS. Miles Davis's close friends and bandmates pianist Herbie Hancock and saxophonist Wayne Shorter are coming to India to create and improve HIV-AIDS awareness.

The duo, along with students from the world famous Thelonius Monk Jazz Institute, will perform in New Delhi and Mumbai from January 15. They will also hold master classes for young Indian musicians. The Mumbai concert is sponsored by the Economic Times.

On January 15, the artistes and Indian musicians will perform in a special concert in Delhi in honour of the birth anniversary of American civil rights leader Martin Luther King and the 100th anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi's Satyagraha movement.

Shorter is known to be a master writer and one of the few people who brought music to Davis that didn't get changed. He is a six time Grammy award winner.

Hancock, on the other hand, is a one-time Oscar winner and 10-time Grammy winner, who brought elements of rock, funk and soul into jazz. Both were part of Davis's Second Great Quintet in the mid-1960s.

Robin Diallo, first secretary, cultural affairs, US embassy, told TOI,"It can't get bigger than this. These two are the greatest living musicians of our time. This is the third consecutive year in which the US government has brought leading jazz stars to India. Renowned jazz singer Al Jarreau, guitarist Earl Klugh and Grammy-nominated saxophonist Kenny Garrett have toured India as part of this programme. When in India, Wayne and Herbie will create awareness on AIDS, and will visit the AIDS Healthcare Foundation to interact with HIV positive patients."

Anti-AIDS campaigns have excited several global celebrities to join the fight against the disease. These include the world’s richest man Bill Gates, former US president Bill Clinton, super model Claudia Schiffer, British high society regular Jemima Khan, actors Ralph Fiennes, Roger Moore and Richard Gere, actresses Salma Hayek, Ashley Judd and Elizabeth Taylor, footballers Rio Ferdinand and David Beckham, singers Robbie Williams, Bono and Alicia Keys.

The year 2006 marked the 25th anniversary of the first reported cases of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Since then, nearly 65 million people worldwide have been infected with HIV and AIDS has killed more than 25 million. An estimated 40 million people are living with HIV. By Kounteya Sinha [ 5 Jan, 2007 TIMES NEWS NETWORK ]

Jazz legends to lead fight against AIDS

The below article is interesting and we at SAHAYA maybe can aim to organize something like this. Anyone we know attending?

NEW DELHI: Two of the world's best known jazz artists will join the planet's fight against AIDS. Miles Davis's close friends and bandmates pianist Herbie Hancock and saxophonist Wayne Shorter are coming to India to create
and improve HIV-AIDS awareness.

The duo, along with students from the world famous Thelonius Monk Jazz Institute, will perform in New Delhi and Mumbai from January 15. They will also hold master classes for young Indian musicians. The Mumbai concert is sponsored by the Economic Times.

On January 15, the artistes and Indian musicians will perform in a special concert in Delhi in honour of the birth anniversary of American civil rights leader Martin Luther King and the 100th anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi's Satyagraha
movement.

Shorter is known to be a master writer and one of the few people who brought music to Davis that didn't get changed. He is a six time Grammy award winner.

Hancock, on the other hand, is a one-time Oscar winner and 10-time Grammy winner, who brought elements of rock, funk and soul into jazz. Both were part of Davis's Second Great Quintet in the mid-1960s.

Robin Diallo, first secretary, cultural affairs, US embassy, told TOI,"It can't get bigger than this. These two are the greatest living musicians of our time. This is the third consecutive year in which the US government has brought leading jazz stars to India. Renowned jazz singer Al Jarreau, guitarist Earl Klugh and Grammy-nominated saxophonist Kenny Garrett have toured India as part of this programme. When in India, Wayne and Herbie will create awareness on AIDS, and will visit the AIDS Healthcare Foundation to interact with HIV positive patients."

Anti-AIDS campaigns have excited several global celebrities to join the fight against the disease. These include the world’s richest man Bill Gates, former US president Bill Clinton, super model Claudia Schiffer, British high society regular Jemima Khan, actors Ralph Fiennes, Roger Moore and Richard Gere, actresses Salma Hayek, Ashley Judd and Elizabeth Taylor, footballers Rio Ferdinand and David Beckham, singers Robbie Williams, Bono and Alicia Keys.

The year 2006 marked the 25th anniversary of the first reported cases of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Since then, nearly 65 million people worldwide have been infected with HIV and AIDS has killed more than 25 million. An estimated 40 million people are living with HIV. By Kounteya Sinha [ 5 Jan, 2007 TIMES NEWS NETWORK ]

India- The new age AIDS Capital!

Watch this slide show, from L.A.Times. It is indeed sad that we now have the dubious rank of being AIDS Capital!

Interactive Feature

India: The New AIDS Capital

(Flash)

FACTS ABOUT AIDS
5.7 million: Indians living with HIV
38 percent:

Those infected who are women IN THE 25 YEARS since it was identified, the virus that causes AIDS has traveled a highway of humanity to all corners of Earth. It has crossed oceans and continents; it stalks the world's most marginal people as they struggle to survive.K. Sangeetha's husband brought HIV/AIDS home to their village of Gangaikondacholapuram on a rickety bus from Chennai, the coastal city better known to many as Madras. Each day, poor men like him from villages throughout the world's second most populous country head to the booming cities to find work. The road from Sangeetha's village to Chennai to the north is about 175 miles; along the way laborers find work in quarries, brick plants or sugar cane fields.When they go, the men stay for months at a time, leaving their wives and children as they try to earn enough money to pull their families out of the poverty of subsistence farming. Many of them also encounter prostitutes while they are away from home and contract HIV. Many, like Sangeetha's husband, die. India has surpassed South Africa as the country with the largest number of people living with HIV/AIDS. As of last year, there were an estimated 5.7 million of them.India's government is fighting back. It is offering free antiretroviral drugs in the larger cities. A local organization has enlisted barbers in the fight: They hand out free condoms and comic books to educate men about the disease.

Rural people have heard that there is hope if they can get to the cities. But for many of them, it still is out of reach. For some who have been stricken, the seven-hour bus ride to Chennai and hours of standing in line for a month's supply of drugs are too difficult. For others, the $6 cost of the bus ticket is too much.So they stay home, often stigmatized by their neighbors, left to confront the certainty of decline and death in the same isolation in which they lived. Sangeetha, a 35-year-old widow with a 15-year-old daughter, was one such woman. She died this fall.

LONE BATTLE: Once subjected to social ridicule, Lalita is now the darling of all in Nalanda.

HIV+ve lady on awareness campaign

Prabhakar Kumar

CNN-IBN

Posted Saturday , December 16, 2006 at 09:42Updated Saturday , December 16, 2006 at 11:17

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Patna/Nalanda: Through Innumerable AIDS campaigns, you might be aware the ways in which one can contract the dreaded disease. But despite being a woman, an AIDS affected patient Lalita Devi is taking the campaign to the truck drivers amongst others.

Lalita Devi runs HIV awareness campaign among truck drivers and also holds awareness session at a local dhaba in Nalanda, Bihar. Lalita herself is an AIDS patient and her husband succumbed to AIDS an year ago.

"Ye batate hai char karan se AIDS se failta hai – youn sambandha banane se, ek hi syringe se sui lene se, bina jane hue khun chadhane se, garbhawati mahila se uske bachhe ko; garva main bache se HIV nahi failta hai. Saath rahne se, saath khane se, chumban lene se, sachiwalya jane se aur uthne baithne se, ek saath kaam karne se nahi failta. (I say that AIDS may spread through four means – unprotected sex, using common needle for injections, transmission of contaminated blood and during pregnancy, from infected mother to her child. The virus does not spread from touching, using the same bathroom, kissing, working or eating together," said Lalita Devi.

She spends her day on roadside dhabas, sticking posters and distributing condoms among truck drivers, the most vulnerable community of all. She also takes a trip to nearby villages to talk to families, apart from spending time with other patients.

"Abhi madad ye karti hai ki batati hai – ye karna hai, ye nahi karna hai, ye khana – sharir acha rahega (She used to tell what to do, what not to do, what to eat to stay healthy)," said Girija Devi, another AIDS patient.

The dreaded HIV virus has affected her physically but not her fighting spirit. Instead of sulking down Lalita is fighting back though it's a lone battle. And once subjected to social ridicule, Lalita is now the darling of all.

"Saab koi baithate hai, saab koi bolte hai, sang rahte hai – Pahle ghrina karte, log bhagte hai. Jab se sanstha main kaaam karti hai koi ghrina nahi mangte. (Everyone has accepted her now. People were earlier repulsed but now everyone's attitude has changed)," said Lalita's mother-in-law Jimanti Devi.

Lalita, no doubt, is an inspiration for others fighting this disease, which has, in recent times, become one of India's most dreaded enemies.

(With inputs from Sahboob Alam and Nikhil Dev)

True or False...

India 'overestimates' HIV/Aids

The study says infection rates could be 40% lower than estimatedMethods used to estimate the number of people infected by HIV/Aids in India are flawed and the actual number of cases may be far lower, a study says.
The UN estimates that India has the highest number of HIV infections, with 5.7 million people carrying the virus.
The survey of blood samples reported by British journal BMC Medicine suggests the true figure may be 40% of that.
UN and Indian experts queried whether a study conducted in one district in the south could be extrapolated nationwide.
Blood samples
The study is based on research in Guntur district in the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, which is worst-hit by the infection.
India may be overestimating its HIV burden with the currently used official estimation method
Lalit Dandona, Study author
Investigators collected blood samples from 12,617 people aged between 15 and 49 in Guntur - one of the worst affected areas in the state - to come to their conclusions.
The method estimated that there were 45,900 people living with HIV in Guntur, compared with the estimate of 112,600 reached by the official method.
Extrapolating findings in Guntur, the study's suggests there may be between 3.2 million and 3.5 million adults with the infection in India.
"India may be overestimating its HIV burden with the currently used official estimation method," the study said.
However, study investigator Dr Lalit Dandona said that even though his team's numbers were smaller, they were "by no means suggesting that the problem is already taken care of".
Speaking to the BBC, Dr Dandona agreed that more research needed to be conducted elsewhere in India to substantiate the study's findings, but he stood by its methodology.
'Useful'
The official method uses data collected from ante-natal and STD clinics and public hospitals.
Even if it were right in Guntur, it would not mean it is right all over India
Denis Broun, UNAids India
Dr Dandona said he believed that there was no intentional effort to inflate the numbers, but the official method gave a flawed picture.
This is because the number of people with the infection reporting to the clinics and public hospitals were not representative of their true numbers in the population, he said.
UNAids chief in India Dr Denis Broun told the Associated Press that this was a "good study and definitely useful".
But he said there were problems with the methods used for arriving at its conclusion.
"Even if it were right in Guntur, it would not mean it is right all over India," he said.
A member of India's National Aids Council, Dr Sarojit Jana, stood by the way official figures were collated. He told the BBC that it was "not right" to make conclusions on the basis of a single district.
Aids awareness campaigners at the Naz Foundation agreed and warned that the study could create a "false sense of security".
Recently, former US President Bill Clinton called India the epicentre of the global HIV/Aids epidemic.
A report in India warned that its economy would suffer if the country fails to check the spread of HIV and Aids - economic growth currently at 8% could fall by nearly 1% if the disease is not contained, it said.

Condom Kumar Pay Attention!!

Condoms 'too big' for Indian men

By Damian Grammaticus BBC News, Delhi

There is a "lack of awareness" over condom sizes

A survey of more than 1,000 men in India has concluded that condoms made according to international sizes are too large for a majority of Indian men.

The study found that more than half of the men measured had penises that were shorter than international standards for condoms.

It has led to a call for condoms of mixed sizes to be made more widely available in India.

The two-year study was carried out by the Indian Council of Medical Research.

Representative

Over 1,200 volunteers from the length and breadth of the country had their penises measured precisely, down to the last millimetre.

The scientists even checked their sample was representative of India as a whole in terms of class, religion and urban and rural dwellers.

The problem affects HIV prevention

The conclusion of all this scientific endeavour is that about 60% of Indian men have penises which are between three and five centimetres shorter than international standards used in condom manufacture.

Doctor Chander Puri, a specialist in reproductive health at the Indian Council of Medical Research, told the BBC there was an obvious need in India for custom-made condoms, as most of those currently on sale are too large.

The issue is serious because about one in every five times a condom is used in India it either falls off or tears, an extremely high failure rate.

And the country already has the highest number of HIV infections of any nation.

Mr Puri said that since Indians would be embarrassed about going to a chemist to ask for smaller condoms there should be vending machines dispensing different sizes all around the country.

"Smaller condoms are on sale in India. But there is a lack of awareness that different sizes are available. There is anxiety talking about the issue. And normally one feels shy to go to a chemist's shop and ask for a smaller size condom."

'Not a problem'

But Indian men need not be concerned about measuring up internationally according to Sunil Mehra, the former editor of the Indian version of the men's magazine Maxim.

"It's not size, it's what you do with it that matters," he said.

"From our population, the evidence is Indians are doing pretty well.

"With apologies to the poet Alexander Pope, you could say, for inches and centimetres, let fools contend."

Watch SAHAYA Youth Against AIDS on MTV desi

Well, we have been informed that MTV desi will be airing all week this week under MTV News the SAHAYA Youth Against AIDS launch event that took place on Nov 28th! If any of you (who did not attend the event) get to watch it, please write in your comments and let us know what are some of your ideas and thoughts on how to make SAHAYA Youth Against AIDS a focussed youth campaign on HIV/AIDS in India. Also, the last date for the nominations is coming up soon.. Dec 25th!! So, get into the spirit of holidays and work towards better health for all those suffering with HIV infection. Nominate yourself to the Leadership Council and join to combat HIV/AIDS....we need creative ideas and solutions on how to make and take this youth campaign to India!!