ISLAMABAD, February 21 — Pakistan’s parliamentary body has raised serious concerns over what it described as unreliable and incomplete HIV/AIDS statistics, warning that inaccurate reporting could damage the country’s credibility at international forums, according to The Express Tribune.
The concerns were raised during a meeting of the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on National Health Services, chaired by Mahesh Kumar Malani. Lawmakers questioned the accuracy of figures presented by the health ministry, stating that the data appeared inconsistent with provincial records.
Officials told the committee that the National AIDS Programme spends approximately $300 to $500 annually per registered HIV patient. However, Pakistan Peoples Party lawmaker Shazia Sobia Somro criticized the ministry’s report, saying it failed to account for a large number of cases nationwide.
Somro said that about 40,000 HIV patients were recorded in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in 2025 alone, along with approximately 300 cases in Islamabad and between 7,000 and 8,000 in Balochistan. Despite these figures, the federal report listed only 81,000 patients nationwide and did not include comprehensive data from several regions.
She warned that submitting inaccurate statistics to international health organizations could harm Pakistan’s global standing. Somro also alleged that the Islamabad Healthcare Regulatory Authority had provided outdated figures instead of updated data when requested.
Additionally, she raised concerns about reports of illegal abortions, claiming that such procedures were occurring in as many as 60 percent of certain cases, highlighting broader issues related to governance and oversight.
Responding to the criticism, Federal Health Minister Mustafa Kamal acknowledged systemic challenges and said it was unrealistic to expect longstanding shortcomings to be resolved quickly. He also said estimates suggesting Pakistan’s HIV burden could be as high as 300,000 cases were largely speculative.
The minister added that under the Global Fund framework, approximately 25 percent of HIV response funding is managed by the government, while 75 percent is distributed through non-governmental organizations, reflecting the structural complexity of the country’s public health response.
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