BLANTYRE, May 11 (Xinhuanet) -- The Malawi government announced anambitious 196 million US dollar free anti-retroviral drugs (ARVs) roll-out five-year program Tuesday for the country's AIDS sufferers.

    Making the landmark announcement, Health Minister Yusuf Mwawa told a press conference in the commercial capital, Blantyre, the plan would "at long last open doors of hope for those who have allalong lived been in despair."

    "Starting this month government is beginning to make available free anti-retroviral drugs to HIV infected people," he said.

    Mwawa said 50 sites throughout the country have been identifiedfor the program, funded by the Global Fund. Malawi has received 9.5 million dollars from the fund for anti-retroviral drugs this year, he said. The Fund has bankrolled the country's AIDS program to the tune of 196 million US dollars over five years from 2004.

    He said the sites will include hospitals run by the Malawi Defense Force and the Malawi Police Service, two sectors seriouslyhit by the pandemic.

    But critics say the ambitious program, coming only a week before Malawians go to the polls to elect a new president and a new parliament, smacks of electioneering. But Mwawa, who admitted this just may be his last major assignment as health minister, dismissed the suggestions, saying the government cannot stop functioning just because of an election.

    "We can't put everything on hold simply because we are voting next week," he said.

    HIV/AIDS has reached crisis proportions in Malawi, with 14 percent of the population of 11 million affected. Mwawa said Malawi, with its relatively tiny population, "has almost as many HIV infected people as the United States and Canada combined."

    Bizwick Mwale, the National AIDS Commission executive director,said 85,000 people die every year from HIV/AIDS complications, about 10 die every hour. He said out of the country's 860,000 orphans, half were directly orphaned by the pandemic.

    "What we are seeing now is the real impact of the epidemic after several years of incubation," he said. "The economy has beenaffected in all sectors because of the pandemic."

    "We therefore believe that the opportunity of a scaled up ARV program countrywide is welcome because we know ARVs in developed countries have turned this disease from a fatal epidemic to a merechronic disease," he said.

    Since the first case of HIV/AIDS was confirmed in Malawi in 1985, life expectancy in the country has been reduced to around 36.

    The free anti-retroviral drugs roll-out program is just one of the frontiers where the AIDS pandemic is being fought. Johns Hopkins project in Blantyre has announced that Malawi joins the global campaign to search for an AIDS vaccine this month.

    Study Coordinator Jane Mallewa said the study will start this month with Malawian volunteers.

    At least 14 percent of the Malawi population of about 11 million is living with HIV, the virus that can lead to AIDS. Mwawasaid currently only 6,000 Malawians are on anti-retrovirals out of150,000 "who are in need of this therapy." Some 760,000 adults in Malawi are infected with HIV, 56 percent of them women. Enditem