Message from Special Secretary & Director General, NACO
Welcome to Chennai
It is our pleasure to welcome you to the 12th National Conference of AIDS Society of India – ASICON 2019 at Chennai from 22-24 November.
It’s for the first time that ASICON is being held in Chennai. Established in the year 2000, ASI is now 19 years old, is now in its adulthood.
ASI is now a matured and well recognized organization, thanks to the efforts and support of hundreds of its members and well-wishers across the globe.
ASI’s main mandate of organising national conference, first in 2005 and then annually since 2009, is on track. Its second mandate to publish a
newsletter/journal has been initiated last year and will be taken on a regular path by ASICON 2019. Apart from organizing several continued medical
education (CMEs), training workshops, symposia and partnering with several like-minded organisations on regular basis over the years,
ASI has also achieved its much desired advisory status in last few years.
ASICON 2019 will be a major turning point in our over three decades of battling HIV/AIDS. After India adopted WHO‘s Test & Treat strategy as a national policy, the entire machinery
has been gearing up to achieve the target of 90:90:90 by 2020 realistically and countdown will begin right after ASICON 2019. The HIV/AIDS (Prevention and Control) Act 2017 – the
law with several provisions to strengthen the PLHIV and prevent their discrimination and human rights violations has come in force, though it is still in dormancy.
Several new Antiretroviral (ARV) molecules and ART combinations are made available changing the entire treatment paradigm. It will also be just a right opportunity to
discuss the highlights at IAS 2019 to be held in July at Mexico and The Union TB Conference to be held from 30 Oct. to 2 Nov. 2019 at Hyderabad.
