Jamshedpur, June 23: The Jharkhand State Aids Control Society (JSACS) has been allocated a whopping Rs 6 crore by the National AIDS Control Organisation (Naco) to combat HIV/AIDS in the state in the current financial.
The JSACS sources informed they had received a notice from the Naco headquarters in Delhi only yesterday about the allocation of funds for the state.
Earlier in March this year, the society had submitted an annual action plan involving a sum of over Rs 9 crore for the current financial.
According to JSACS joint director D.P. Taneja, the fund would be utilised for strengthening thrust areas like targeted intervention (TI), information, education and communication (IEC), establishment of blood banks, STD (sexually-transmitted disease) clinics and voluntary counselling and testing centres (VCTC) in every district of the state.
Asked what would be the activities in focus this year, he said: ?Establishment of more VCTCs, STD clinics and blood banks, extending training modules to doctors and representatives of NGOs.?
Sources said the society wanted to rope in more reputed NGO?s this year for effective implementation of the TI project in the state.
The targeted intervention project is aimed to providing preventive mechanism against the fatal disease among specific social groups like adolescents between 13-19 years of age, commercial sex workers and truck drivers.
Last year, however, the JSACS could utilise only around Rs 1.5 crore for the anti-AIDS drive in the state against the submitted annual action plan, involving a sum of Rs 7 crore.
During their visit in April this year, the expert team from World Bank and Naco had expressed dissatisfaction over the non-utilisation of the fund by the society.
Though the society intends to strengthen its base at the block and panchayat levels, as of now, it has kept its activities restricted to the district level.
According to sources, nine VCTCs existed in different districts and a total of 15 STD clinics had been established. Figures available with the JSACS claim there are 62 full-blown cases of AIDS in the state.
