Aiming to spread awareness on HIV/AIDS among the people, especially the vulnerable group of young people and fighting stigma and discrimination against people living with HIV, the Union Health Ministry will soon re-launch the Red Ribbon Express programme which the government had launched in 2007 and discontinued after one year year. The Red Ribbon Express, which will be a train carrying HIV prevention messages, is expected to be flagged-off on World AIDS Day on December 1.

According to sources, union minister for health Ghulam Nabi Azad had already given directions to the senior officials in the ministry to relaunch the project to publicize and ensure mass-mobilization campaign on HIV/AIDS in the country. The nitty-gritties of this national campaign is being worked out by the officials in the ministry who will give final shape to the programme very soon.

Senior officials in the ministry said that the Red Ribbon Express initiative will be a powerful medium for the dissemination of HIV related information to the public for behavioural change which will be an important focus area of the programme. It is proposed to mainstream and include partners from various ministries as well as civil society to facilitate a coordinated multi-sectoral response.

There are an estimated 23 lakh people living with HIV in India. The National AIDS Control Organization (NACO) has undertaken specific actions to control and reverse the epidemic and its efforts have yielded significant results as is evident in the declining HIV prevalence rates in the country. The Red Ribbon Express is once again being put into action by NACO to consolidate these early gains. This multi-sectoral initiative on wheels, it is envisaged, will bring together peoples’ representatives, programme functionaries, opinion leaders, media, civil society and citizens to offer a coordinated response to the HIV epidemic in India.

Last time, the programme was launched on December 1, 2007 and the Red Ribbon Express had traversed over 27,000 kms across the length and breadth of the country making 180 halts, covering 166 districts, reaching out to crore of people in over 50,000 villages for scaling up ground level mobilization activities.