BANGALORE, India, Dec 5 (AFP) - A foundation started by software mogul Bill Gates Friday launched a 25 million-dollar program to curb AIDS in south India that will include highway centres providing condoms and education about HIV.
The initiative for the state of Karnataka, which includes India's hi-tech hub Bangalore, is part of 200 million dollars pledged by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to fight AIDS in India, which has more HIV-positive people than any country except South Africa.
The program will fund centres staffed by health professionals in 15 of Karnataka's 27 districts that will offer tests and counselling about AIDS.
Among the centres will be highway stops set up with the state-run Indian Oil Corporation to provide information and condoms to truck drivers and migrant workers, groups vulnerable to the disease.
The project, spearheaded by a state agency, includes grants to three partners: the University of Manitoba in Canada, the Transport Corporation of India and non-governmental Population Services International.
The University of Manitoba, which has already been working on AIDS in the state through a Canadian government-funded project, will focus on encouraging condom use among sex workers and their clients.
India officially has 4.58 million people with HIV, the virus that leads to AIDS.
Karnataka accounts for a disproportionate 500,000 cases with AIDS the leading cause of death for the 15-49 age range, according to the Gates Foundation.
"The HIV prevention initiative launched today is unprecedented in scale and scope and offers an opportunity to demonstrate the potential of public-private partnerships," said Karnataka's leader, Chief Minister S.M. Krishna.
India's Hindu nationalist-led federal government has been criticised in the past for focusing on sexual abstinence rather than condom use.
But the government announced a major AIDS initiative November 30, saying it was negotiating with pharmaceutical firms in a bid to give Indian patients the world's cheapest AIDS drugs.
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