If the National Social Health Insurance Scheme is passed, then the country will have 181,000 people and 250,000 others in ARV treatment by 2005 and 2010, respectively, Health Minister Charity Ngilu said.

"The number of people need of urgent anti-retroviral treatment or else they will die is estimated at 200,000 people," the statement quoted Ngilu as saying.

Ngilu said the number of people receiving ARV therapy is around 19,000, which is about 10 percent, while the remaining 90 percent will die.

"Teachers, civil servants and other public employees will not be required to contribute their medical allowances into the scheme," except for a small subscription fee, she explained.

"The ministry of health will utilize the resources allocated to it through the regular budget to intensify disease prevention activities and improve quality of health services in public health facilities," she added.

Ngilu urged donors to support Kenya in its efforts to fight the disease that has killed about 1.5 million people since 1984.

Kenya insists that the HIV/AIDS prevalence in the country has reduced from 14 percent in 2000 to seven percent this year, (from 2.5 million AIDS patients to about 1.4 million), a figure vehemently disputed by UNAIDS.

All rights reserved. � 2005 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.