February 22, 2007
On Sunday, India's National AIDS Control Organization said it has ordered a survey to determine whether doctors are prescribing appropriate HIV/AIDS treatment to patients. "We want to find out whether doctors are giving the right drugs and the right doses," said NACO chief Sujatha Rao. The move is in response to findings by UNAIDS that Indian doctors wrongly prescribed second-line medicines, the Press Trust of India reported. Prescribing second-line drugs in an effort to speed-up results can cause drug resistance, said Denis Broun, UNAIDS' country coordinator. About 40,000 patients in India are receiving free HIV treatment through a government program that began in 2004.