Mizzima: Asia-Pacific to influence

[mizzima@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

"Asia-Pacific has potential to greatly influence the world's HIV
epidemic," UNAIDS

New Delhi, March 4, 2000
Mizzima News Group

India has the highest number of HIV infections in the world and Burma's
infection rates are high and rising though its accurate data is
difficult to find. This was stated by UNAIDS ?INDIA in its latest facts
on HIV/AIDS in Asia.

As Asian countries grow economically, people move to cities from the
countryside for better economic opportunities and the virus is spread
through truckers, traders, contract laborers, sailors and their sexual
partners. Moreover, areas near national borders present higher risk.
Some studies suggest that busy land border crossings and international
fishing ports have higher rates of HIV and sexually transmitted
infections than other locations. Men who have sex with men represent one
of the highest risk groups because of the transmission probabilities
associated with unprotected anal sex.

The UNAIDS statistics show that by 1999, the region contained nearly 60%
of the world's adult population and about 20% of the world's estimated
HIV infections. The major force driving the epidemic in Asia is
heterosexual transmission. With a population of nearly 3.5 billion, the
Asia-Pacific region has the potential to greatly influence the course of
the global epidemic. The highest HIV prevalence can be found in
Cambodia, Thailand, Burma and India.

Some 3.7 million Indians have HIV or AIDS at present and Asia's highest
levels of infection are recorded in Cambodia, where HIV appears well
established in the general population in all provinces. While Thailand's
well-established HIV prevention efforts continue to bear fruit, with a
fall in prevalence (proportion of adults living with HIV/AIDS), it had
estimated 800,000 cases of HIV infection in the end of 1999.

Asia region has been significantly affected by injecting drug users.
Drug users in the region are rapidly switching from non-injecting drugs
to injecting drugs, forcing previously undetectable levels of HIV to
increase significantly.

Bangladesh is estimated to have 25,000 drug injectors who share needles
and syringes daily and the virus among them is bound to spread. In
India's northeastern states, which border with Burma, HIV infection has
sped through networks of drug injections, and from them to their wives.

In Burma too, over 60% of teenage drug injectors are infected with HIV
and teenagers are indeed the only group of drug injectors whom HIV
prevalence has continued to climb steadily since the early 1990s. UNICEF
and the Myanmar Red Cross have developed an HIV/AIDS curriculum in Burma
to help teachers and peer educators train young people on
decision-making, communication and negotiation skills in schools.