“We call upon national and community leaders to serve as examples and include people living with HIV/AIDS (PLHAs) in the process to forming national programmes. We also call upon businesses to invest in their communities and we ask the institutions of faith to be more inclusive,” a declaration by the Candlelight Memorial Sunday said here last night.
“The role of civil society is critical to ending HIV/AIDS, but we cannot work alone and hope is not enough. We need action, and communities and governments must work together,” it added.
They also asked global leaders to keep their promises of providing adequate resources for patients.
An estimated over 19,000 people are infected with the disease in Nagaland and 39 targeted intervention (TI) programmes under NSACS and 15 under Project ORCHID (funded by Bill and Milinda Gates Foundation) are being implemented in the State.