PESHAWAR, April 8: The government has approved a project worth Rs2.8 billion to spread awareness against AIDS, said a health department official on Tuesday.

“The amount has been approved to run a sustainable campaign regarding awareness about HIV/AIDS,” he said and added that the NWFP would receive Rs270 million under the project in the next financial year.

He said two-thirds of the amount would be loaned and the rest would be grant-in-aid.

However, the NWFP government wanted to get the entire amount as grant-in-aid because of its financial position, he said.

The loan would be extended to the government by the World Bank on soft  terms, which it would release to the provinces.

The money is meant to be spent in five years on the AIDS awareness campaign and the government is bound to pay 0.5 per cent interest on the unspent money at the end of every financial year.

In the NWFP, about 270 cases, including 19 women, have been reported since the launch of the HIV/AIDS control programme in 1995-96.

He said the lack of support staff was hampering the functions of the provincial AIDS control programme.

He said the funds would be spent in collaboration with the non-governmental organizations, Ulema and community leaders.

The official said people returning from the United Arab Emirates could spread the disease in the absence of any mechanism at the airports to screen them. He said the disease could assume alarming proportions.

The United Nations Children’s Fund has allocated Rs2 million to be utilized by the NGOs and Rs1 million at the disposal of the AIDS control programme. Mardan, Swat, Kohat, Hangu and Haripur districts have been selected where focus would be on educating the class 9th and 10th students, religious scholars, drivers and conductors on the issue.