Nigerian President Mr Olusegun Obasanjo today told health authorities to carry out free HIV/AIDS tests for more than 500,000 volunteers as part of a campaign against the disease.
"I am to arrange for over half a million Nigerians to be screened within the shortest possible time, but it will be voluntary testing and counselling," health minister Mr Alphonsus Nwosu told journalists.
The testing and counselling for AIDS is linked to prevention of mother-to-child transmission of the disease and promotion of the anti-retroviral trial drugs.
Nigeria is conducting large-scale trials of cheap generic anti-retroviral drugs imported from India in a bid to stop the
spread of AIDS. The government recently set up 25 AIDS treatment centres across the country that will focus on administering the drugs to patients at highly subsidised prices.
The trial programme is designed to cover 15,000 HIV/AIDS sufferers, including 5,000 children at a subsidised rate of 12,000 naira (100 dollars) per patient per year.
"So far, the responses have been very good," the minister said. Some 3.6 million people are believed to suffer from HIV/AIDS in Nigeria, which has a population of 120 million.