HIV Sentinel Surveillance National Report 2012-2013: India

India has one of the world’s largest and most robust HIV sentinel surveillance (HSS) systems. Since 1998 it has helped the national government to monitor the trends, levels, and burden of HIV among different population groups and develop effective control measures. The HSS is implemented across the country with support from two national institutes and six regional public health institutes.

The 13th round of HSS was implemented during 2012-13 at 750 antenatal clinics (ANC) surveillance sites, covering 556 districts across 34 states and union territories (UTs) in the country. The methodology adopted during the HSS was consecutive sampling with unlinked anonymous testing. Specimens were tested for HIV following the two-test protocol. However, nine sites could not achieve the minimum required sample size and were excluded. A total of 2,94,732 ANC samples collected and tested from the 741 valid sites have been considered for the analysis in this report.