HYDERABAD: Over a lakh people living with HIV (PLHIV) in Telangana and a considerable number of PLHIVs from AP are required to undergo Viral Load Testing once in every six months. With the Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare JP Nadda announcing on February 26 that viral load testing will be offered free of cost to all PLHIVs, health officials in the State have no options but follow the latest instructions.
In the past, only PLHIVs with deteriorating conditions underwent viral load test. Incidentally, since 2008, there has been only one viral load test machine catering to PLHIVs across the two Telugu states. In such a scenario, one had to wait for a scheduled appointment and only 300 samples could be tested on an average in a month. Further, one had to wait for a week or so to collect the medical test report.
Now, in all likelihood, five more viral load testing machines, provided by National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) would be put to use from April at five more government hospitals in the State.
The new machines would be placed at Niloufer Hospital, Osmania General Hospital, Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Hospital in Warangal and Government Medical College in Nizamabad, and existing machine at Gandhi hospital will be replaced.
The crucial test helps to know number of HIV or copies of virus in one millilitre of blood. State AIDS Clinical Expert Panel (SACEP) Clinic decides whether a person should be put on second line of drug regiment based on the test results.
However, currently, the test is performed only if a PLHIV’s health deteriorates, their immunity against diseases comes down. And by the time the test is performed, the disease would have progressed.
When a person reaches this stage, copies of virus in a person increases and chances of transmission of the virus from the PLHIVS too increases.
“This test will be performed for every PLHIV once in six months. As we get to know severity of disease, we can prevent its progress before it worsens. The new machines are expected to arrive in a few days,” said Dr Preeti Meena, project director, Telangana State AIDS Control Society (TSACS).
Since there is only one viral load testing machine for the two Telugu States, PLHIVs from all districts in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh have to come all the way to Gandhi Hospital to undergo the test. Besides the five new machines, some samples will also be sent to a private diagnostic laboratory in Mumbai to bring down burden of testing samples.With the new machines, the waiting time is expected tobe cut down to one to three-days.
Data is 14-years old
Shocking as it can be, the latest data available is from 2004 and it suggests presence of 1.8 lakh PLHIVs in the two States. Of them, some have died, some might have migrated to other States. TSACS has taken up data cleaning process. “Of the 1.8 lakh people, 30000 have died , 75,000 are on treatment, 30,000 come for check-ups. Around 20,000 left without follow-up treatment.The data cleaning process is underway,” said Dr Preeti Meena, TSACS project director.
She added that their counsellors along with NGOs are trying to find what happened to rest of the people. Around 300 samples a month are tested using the Gandhi Hospital’s Viral Load Testing machine. When asked if five new machines and the provision to send samples to a private laboratory is enough to test all PLHIVs, she said that they will write to the government.
New machines sans lab technician?
While five more viral load testing machines are set to be provided to government hospitals in the city, there is no clarity on whether trained lab technicians too will be provided to conduct the tests. Currently, most of the Government hospitals have less staff and the routine diagnostic tests are not performed owing to lack of technical staff.
TADA supports NMC Bill and bridge course
From the time the National Medical Commission (NMC) Bill-2017 was made public, doctors practising modern medicine have been pitting against practitioners of Homeopathy, Ayurveda and Unani. The draft bill has a provision which seeks to enable AYUSH practitioners to prescribe allopathy medicines, after pursuing a bridge course. For first time, on Sunday, Telangana AYUSH Doctors Association (TADA) members supported the bill and bridge course, at a meet on Sunday.