NEW DELHI, May 17: DHABAS along busy highways will no longer be the same. They are soon to become ``AIDS points'' - places where health services and free condoms will be provided, films shown and messages on HIV flashed via TV and radio.

A staggering 80,000 truck drivers (8.5 per cent of the total 30 - 50 lakh in India) are believed to be at risk from HIV. Studies have shown that at least 10 lakh truck drivers practice high-risk behaviour. A limited study found that 51 per cent truckers reported at least one sexually transmitted disease (STD)

The implications of these statistics have seriously alarmed health experts. In view of their peripatetic lifestyles, HIV positive truck drivers could set off a whole chain of infection: they are likely to infect not just their families but prostitutes who could contaminate other clients.

Cleaners, who generally hero-worship their drivers, also tend to follow the same behaviour pattern so there is the added risk of younger people becoming vulnerable to HIV-AIDS.

Recognising that it is not possible to persuade truckers to radically change their habits nor get them to visit health clinics, the National Aids Control Organisation (NACO) has come up with a solution: Take health services and counselling to them.

About Rs 125 crore project, funded by British ODA, began in February this year and is to be conducted in two phases over five years, according to NACO Director P S Bhatnagar.

NACO is now in the process of identifying 300 truckers' halt points all over the country where information, counselling and health services will be given. The attempt, says Bhatnagar, is that no driver should travel for more than one day without being able to access these services. Instead of setting up special booths, roadside dhabas - where truckers normally stop to eat and get rest and recreation - are to be used. A medical worker is to be stationed at each point, preferably a local doctor who would give part-time services and be paid a nominal sum. Besides giving information and counselling on HIV and Aids, STD services will also be provided - an explanation of symptoms and free treatment. Condoms would also be given free since it is known that truckers indulge in high-risk behaviour.

Besides truckers, prostitutes (who generally operate nearby) will also have access to all services. Each halt point would provide services for 3,000-plus truckers each year, worked out on the projection that an average of 10 truckers would visit the point each day and three STD cases would be treated daily.