Background All over the world, with 36.9 million people living with HIV/AIDS, the latter continues to be a major public health problem having tremendous social and economic impact. However, increasing global awareness and availability of effective treatment and prevention programmes, promise a hope of controlling the pandemic.

Methods Serum samples of 53,357 clients who attended ICTC, Sri Guru Ram Das University of Health Sciences (SGRDUHS), Amritsar, Punjab (India) from January 2007 to December 2017,were tested for HIV infection as per NACO guidelines using 3 kits with different antigen preparation/test principles viz. Comb AIDS RS, Meriscreen HIV -1–2 WB & Signal-HIV after a pre-test counseling & taking informed consent.

Results Of the total 53,357 clients tested for HIV infection, 630 (1.2%) were found to be HIV positive.Seropositivity was higher in males 387/630(61.42%) compared to females 243/630(38.57%) although females 29911/53357(56.05%) outnumbered the males 23426/53357(43.9%) in voluntary HIV testing. No transgender visited our ICTC during this period. Heterosexual route was the major route of transmission seen in 507/630 clients (80.47%). Main age group affected was 35–49 years 224/630(35.55%), followed by 25–34 years 185/630(29.36%), >50 years 107/630(16.98%), 15–24 years 77/630(12.22%) & <15 years only 37/630(5.9%).

Conclusion Barring 2011, total number of clients tested each year has shown an ascending trend which can be attributed to increasing global awareness about the disease, decreasing associated stigma, expanded media coverage and the widespread availability of anti-retroviral therapy (ART). Although overall prevalence is low at 1.2%, IDU prevalence saw two peaks viz. 33.33%(4/12) in 2007 and 20%(14/70) in 2012 and currently 8.2% (4/49) in 2017 puts the spotlight on HIV burden in this risk group and suggests the need for the scaling up of focused preventive efforts in high-risk groups.

Disclosure No significant relationships.