Dec05-3

Chinese President Hu Jintao made an unprecedented visit to AIDS patients in a Beijing hospital in November 2004, the eve of World AIDS Day, urging "the whole society to phase out discrimination and estrangement towards them".

Xiao Wei and Lao Ji (pseudonyms) were among those who met Hu, with state television repeatedly showing footage of the meeting without covering up their faces, the China Youth Daily said.

Neighbours and acquaintances back in their village homes in the northern province of Shanxi, where they were infected with HIV in the 1990s through blood selling schemes, have made their life miserable ever since, the newspaper said.

"Local officials came to ask Xiao Wei's landlord to expel his family lest the whole village get infected," it said.

Lao Ji's 11-year-old daughter, who has not contracted HIV, had been isolated by schoolmates and mocked by other children. Villagers even don't allow chickens raised by the family to leave their backyard, it said.

"I cannot forgive them. It's as though we've been sentenced to death by the villagers," Lao Ji's wife, who has not been infected by the virus, was quoted as saying.

China has stepped up the fight against HIV-AIDS in recent years after initially being slow to acknowledge its threat, but public fear and ignorance make the battle an uphill one.

Even among better-educated urban dwellers, nearly 60 percent would be "nervous" to have contact with HIV positive people in public, Xinhua news agency has quoted a Health Ministry survey as saying.

China says it has 840,000 HIV carriers, but experts estimate a much higher figure, with perhaps one million people infected in the central province of Henan alone in a botched blood-selling scheme in mid-1990s.

The government aims to keep the number of cases under 1.5 million by 2010, a number sharply lower than the World Health Organisation projection of 10 million if nothing is done to prevent the disease's spread.

Global AIDS, TB and malaria fund lacks money

Fri Dec 16,12:23 PM ET

A UN-created fund to fight the scourges of AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria warned that it faced a 1.1 billion dollar shortfall for 2006, after scraping together enough funding this week to seal 2005 projects.

Some 728 million dollars in grants were allocated to 63 prevention and treatment projects for 2005, 40 percent of them dealing with HIV/AIDS thanks to grants approved this week, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria said in a statemen on Fridayt.

The last portion was secured with the pledges from Australia, Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Norway, Sweden, and the United Kingdom and a deal to switch some resources to next year.

"Their generosity brings hope to millions of people around the globe who will benefit from the prevention and treatment activities that the Global Fund will support financially," said fund executive director Richard Feachem.

However, the fund "continues to face a resource shortfall" of about 1.1 billion dollars for 2006, and 1.3 billion dollars for 2007, the statement said.

Some 384,000 people are being treated with life-saving AIDS drugs this month, triple the number a year ago, the fund said as it sought to underline its value in the global campaign against HIV/AIDS.

Anti-TB treatment has also expanded significantly, now reaching some one million patients, while anti-malarial bednets have now been distributed to 7.7 million people.

The fund was created in January 2002 by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan to harness finance from governments, business and private donors and help poor nations combat AIDS by channeling money to vetted local projects.

Since an initial 100-million-dollar contribution from Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates set it rolling, the fund has been struggling to secure enough major official promises of support for its multi-billion dollar annual targets.

You've got mail, and maybe gonorrhea

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - You've got mail -- and possibly gonorrhea, HIV or another sexually transmitted disease.

E-mail sent through Web sites launched in Los Angeles and San Francisco is providing people with a free, sometimes anonymous, way to tell their casual sex partners they might have picked up more than they bargained for.

Los Angeles County health officials launched www.inspotla.org this week in a bid to reduce the rapidly rising spread of STDs by encouraging sexually active men and women to get tested.

"This is another opportunity for people to disclose STD exposure to partners because sometimes people don't always have that face-to-face opportunity, or that level of relationship," Karen Mall, director of prevention and testing at the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, said on Thursday.

"Partner disclosure is where we really have the opportunity to break the chain of HIV infection," Mall said.

The site allows users to choose one of six free e-cards to send to their sexual contacts either unsigned or with a personal message that avoids awkward face-to-face disclosure.

"It's not what you brought to the party, it's what you left with," says one e-card featuring a picture of a bare-chested man. "I left with an STD. You might have one too. Get checked out soon."

The Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center, which runs its own counseling services for partner disclosure, welcomed the Web site program.

"Many of the people we are seeing are listing the Internet as the place where they are meeting partners, so the Web site is a really helpful tool for prevention and contacting them," said Tiffany Horton, manager of the center's sexual health program.

The site is modeled on one launched in San Francisco last year (www.inspot.org) which is generating about 500 e-cards a month. Both are targeted at gay men but can be used by anyone.

Health officials call the e-cards a "fast, free and flexible partner notification system" that also gives information and links to local testing sites.

Some 2,400 new AIDS cases were reported in Los Angeles County in 2003, along with more than 8,000 new gonorrhea cases and 830 new syphilis cases -- most of them among gay men.

The Web sites urge users to show respect and not to misuse the system. Mall said only half of 1 percent of the e-cards sent through the San Francisco site had been malicious or fraudulent.

"The sites do not give anybody the ability to do anything they can do already if they had somebody's e-mail," Mall said.

"It is something we can monitor. People can get hold of the Web master if they have concerns or want to complain.

"But I give the (gay) community more credit than that. I think the community really wants to get ahead of HIV and STDs and they realize that notification is really important," she said.

25 percent leap in new Greek HIV cases in 2005

Tue Dec 13, 2:23 PM ET

Greece recorded 522 new cases of HIV in 2005, some 25 percent more than in 2004, Health Minister Nikitas Kaklamanis told a press conference.

Expressing his concern at the upward trend, the minister said a "national plan of action" would be launched at the start of the new year, aiming to raise standards of prevention and treatment.

According to the Centre for Infectious Disease Control (KEEL), recorded HIV cases to December 8 were already 18 percent up on 2004 and are set to finish this year between 24 and 27 percent higher.

The number of infections via heterosexual intercourse rose 9.5 percent compared to 2004 figures, while a record 25 percent of new cases were among women.

Since 1984, a total of 7,643 people have been diagnosed with HIV in Greece, of whom 2,641 have developed full-blown AIDS.

The rise in the infection rate stems from a relaxation of preventative measures due to the efficacy of combination therapies, according to the minister.

But many experts complain of a lack of public information campaigning, particularly in schools.

Some experts, however, believe the rise in recorded cases shows that Greeks are finally becoming more willing to take HIV tests, after years of sweeping the issue under the carpet.

Myanmar reports slight fall in HIV rate, seeks outside help

Mon Dec 12, 1:23 PM ET

Myanmar has reported a slight decline in its HIV rate over the past five years, but still needs outside help to keep fighting the disease, a health official said in a report.

Between 2000 and 2005 Myanmar's HIV rate fell to 1.3 percent of the population from 1.5 percent, Min Thwe, deputy director of Myanmar's National AIDS Programme, told the semi-official Myanmar Times.

Min Thwe also said anti-AIDS efforts had to target young people, especially women, because the men-women ratio of infections had worsened to 3:1 in 2005 from 4:1 in 2000.

Among the combined efforts against the disease, anti-AIDS workers run a "100 percent condom use" promotion campaign in 128 townships and programmes in 58 townships to stop HIV transmission.

"The impact would be much more significant if we can conduct activities such as 100 percent condom use in 80 percent of the country's 324 townships," he was quoted as saying in the weekly's edition published on Monday.

The national programme's activities have been hampered by the decision in August of the Global Fund to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria to withdraw 54 million dollars in funding from the military-ruled country, Min Thwe said.

Global Fund is a partnership of public and private donors, communities, non-governmental organisations and world bodies.

The Myanmar programme had in 2005 planned to operate 10 teams offering counselling, testing and treatment of sexually-transmitted diseases, but could only start three teams, he said.

"If we would like to see a significant impact, we need to scale up the activities that require human and financial resources as well as technical know-how," Min Thwe reportedly said.

Despite the Global Fund's withdrawal, there were many other donors interested in funding anti-AIDS programmes, Min Thwe said.

"Those who understand that the disease knows no boundary have informally pledged us to help fight the disease."

Prostitute mom sparks storm with book

By Alpana SarmaThu Dec 15,10:54 AM ET

Her long, wavy, black hair tied loosely in a knot, 50-year-old Nalini Jameela looks like any other Indian housewife. But this attractive, largely uneducated mother of two is a best-selling author and prostitute whose outspoken views of sex work as a career choice have stirred controversy in conservative India.

Her "Oru Lyngikathozhilaliyude Athmakatha," or The Autobiography of a Sex Worker, dictated to a social activist because she can't write, has angered both feminists, who say it glorifies sex work, and conservatives, who think prostitutes should keep quiet.

"I have written this book for other sex workers. I wanted to talk about it to remove the stigma," Jameela told Reuters through a translator over the phone from her home state of Kerala.

"People think we are bad because we have sex for money. Nobody understands our grief."

Jameela was forced into prostitution 25 years ago when her first husband died, leaving her with a child to support. Sex work paid more than she was earning as a factory worker. She charges her clients between 500-1,000 rupees ($11-$22) per visit.

Her first customer was a policeman. When she came out of the room the next morning, she was beaten up by police on orders of another policeman she had turned down.

"I felt humiliated, but I had no option but to continue."

Jameela estimates she has had sex with more than 1,000 men since then -- she took some time off after her later marriages -- and feels her work is an important social service.

"If there is no sex work, it would lead to a situation comparable to a pressure cooker with its safety valve locked on. The truth is that sex workers are doing a great service," she says in her book in the southern language of Malayalam.

It's a view that angers some feminists.

SEX TALK TABOO

"Prostitution is considered as work" in the book, said K. Ajitha, president of Anweshi, a Kerala women's group. "I don't accept that. Women in prostitution have only the right to sell their bodies, they don't have the right to choose."

Written with I. Gopinath, an activist who works with sex workers, the book has sold more than 10,000 copies in less than six months in a market where 5,000 in a year is a best seller.

Jameela has so far earned 84,000 rupees ($1,830) from book sales.

But in India, public displays of affection are frowned upon and talking about sex publicly is still taboo.

One popular south Indian actress has been pelted with sandals, tomatoes and rotten eggs and hauled before a court for suggesting women might have sex before marriage and telling men not to expect their brides to be virgins anymore.

Protests over her comments lasted more than a month.

Prostitution is outlawed, but India has more than two million sex workers living on the fringes of society. They have few rights and abuse by both customers and the police is common.

Commercial sex is one of the main drivers of the spread of HIV/AIDS and India has more than 5 million reported cases of people living with the virus, rivalling South Africa as the worst hit nation.

The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency estimates more than 20 million people could be infected with HIV in India by 2010 and economists warn it could undermine India's rise to economic superpower status.

Alarmed by the rising numbers, the government's Planning Commission has recommended prostitution be legalized to help fight AIDS.

Many prostitutes are pushed into the trade by traffickers and by poverty and some, including thousands of girls smuggled in from Nepal each year, are held as sex slaves for a decade or more.

Against this backdrop, some women activists accuse Gopinath of interpreting Jameela's words in a way that glorifies prostitution.

"They cannot imagine that a woman on the street can say such things. I cannot imagine all this. These are Jameela's ideas, not mine," Gopinath says.

Says V.C. Harris, a professor at Kerala's MG University: "This is not a victim's book. One of the most striking things about the book is the confidence and inner strength that exudes from it."

Like many women in India, Jameela's education is minimal. She finished school after third grade, which is roughly about 7 years old. Over the years, she married three times and has two grown daughters, now both housewives.

Autobiography of a Sex Worker has brought a degree of fame, money and respect. Jameela's 24-year-old daughter Seena, married and pregnant with her first child, is happy with her mother's fame.

"Earlier, people used to say that because my mother is a prostitute, I must also be one. But now when they call me Nalini Jameela's daughter I feel very good," Seena says.

Neither Seena, nor her sister Latha, have followed their mother's footsteps, although Jameela says that she would not have stopped them from becoming prostitutes if they had wanted to.

"It is not just my daughters. I will tell other women also about the hardships of sex work and then if they want to get into it, I won't stop them," Jameela says.

For her part, Jameela intends to continue with sex work as long as she stays healthy, saying she has had more freedom as a sex worker than she has ever had as a wife.

"Looking back, I find life as a sex worker more enjoyable. As a wife one has to listen, to always be dominated by someone," Jameela said.

"I like being a sex worker. Some become lawyers, doctors. It was my choice to become to a sex worker."

"Through this pilot project, UNODC intends to introduce drug abuse and HIV/AIDS prevention services for prisons in Pakistan on a sustainable basis," Vincent McClean, Country Representative of UNODC, said in a project workshop in the Pakistani capital Islamabad on Tuesday.

With an initial cost of about US $491,000, this three-year pilot project aims to counter the problem of drug abuse and the spread of HIV/AIDS in four selected prisons through interventions enabling prisoners to make their own informed choices vis-à-vis drug abuse, prison life, HIV/AIDS and their own future.

The programme will also improve literacy and vocational skills training opportunities for some 2,000 prisoners, providing them with better chances of employment on release.

Pakistan's narcotics minister, Ghous Bux Mehar, told the workshop that there were 500,000 chronic heroin and injecting drug users in Pakistan, according to a national assessment conducted in 2000.

"These figures would suggest that Pakistan has one of the highest rates of heroin abuse in the world," said Maher. The study also showed that cannabis type drugs like hashish, were the drugs most often reported in common use, followed by heroin, alcohol and tranquillisers, he added.

However, what is a serious problem in the country at large is magnified in its prisons. Due to overcrowding, close confinement, violence, tension and fear, inadequate health facilities, boredom, lack of activity and long prison sentences, drug abuse is widespread, according to experts, which facilitates the spread of HIV and other blood-borne diseases among prisoners.

At the same time, according to UNODC, drug use and homosexual behaviour are rife in most of Pakistan's prisons and sex is often coerced and unprotected.

In about 90 prisons across the country originally designed for a prison population of only 35,000, there are approximately 85,000 inmates who have very limited access to education, vocational training and recreational services.

In 2003, in central Larkana district's prison in southern Sindh province, 29 intravenous drug users (IDUs) were found to be HIV positive out of 210 randomly tested. While earlier this year, another study conducted by the National HIV/AIDS Control Programme revealed that 94 out of 402 IDUs tested randomly on the streets of the southern port city of Karachi, were found HIV positive.

Once the pilot project is completed, it is expected to serve as a model for the implementation of similar action in other prisons on a larger scale, the narcotics minister said.

About 100 kilometers north east of Malawian capital city Lilongwe, lies a sandy poverty-stricken village called Salima. It is here that Morning-Star Rosario, the Namibia Red Cross Society meets Sellina Alusi. An almost fifty year unemployed widow and mother of four, who despite having clear symptoms of HIV/AIDS and getting constant rounds of different illnesses was still reluctant to go for an HIV/AIDS test. Alusi is also one of the 4.8 million people in Malawi affected by hunger as a result of severe drought and poor economic performance in Malawi.

“I have terrible malaria and I struggle to breathe. I also suffer from diarrhea and congestion and it is affecting my productivity in the field,” says Alusi weaving her basket.

During good years, and when Alusi was in good health, she would harvest 30 to 40 bags of rice, but this year due to her bed-ridden situation and erratic agriculture season, she could not even harvest a single bag.

As one walks through Salima it is obvious that there is severe hunger. Fields are dry and abandoned and there were no signs of rain in the sky which may signal another difficult year for Malawi. The mango trees that used to be filled with fruits bear nothing now as the communities has eaten everything as the last resort. Reports in Salima show that mangoes were eaten raw sometimes peeled, boiled and eaten as porridge which they do not do in good times.

Malawi Red Cross volunteers and WFP have started distributing food to the 200 households of Salima targeting families with chronically ill patients and orphans. For the past nine months Alusi has been receiving 50 kg of maize, Soya and cooking oil on a monthly basis.

Alusi’s second born daughter Hadja Ganizani is married and at 25 years old is heavily pregnant with her third child, yet because her mother is weak she walks long distances to fetch the heavy bags of food carrying it on her head and taking it home to the family. Hadja explains that, “the food is never enough to last us a month, we are a big family and therefore when the food gets finished we weave baskets to sell and raise money to buy more food and other necessities. It has become very difficult and unaffordable to get or buy food.”

Asked if she is receiving any treatment, Alusi shows us little yellow pills and says, “I only go to the hospital when I get very ill, my daughter then hires a bicycle and takes me to the clinic about 20 km from here. The nurses only give me Fancida (a Malaria drug) but it does not help and that is why I have to complement it with traditional medicine.”

Alusi has a 28 year old son that has gone to the city in an effort to find a job but has never returned home or assist the family in anyway. However what worries Alusi most is the future of her younger daughters aged 13 and 11. She fears she will not be able to afford their school fees and the girls will be forced to drop out of school at a young age.

It seems the situation in Malawi will only worsen if aid does not come now. Although the government is currently providing free Anti retroviral treatment, it can only be effective with a balanced which is currently a far cry from people like Alusi.

As more people fall ill, productivity decreases and poverty will increase. In October, the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent societies in southern Africa launched a food insecurity appeal of US30 million to support 1.5 million people in the seven most affected nations in this region which include Malawi, Lesotho, Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Swaziland, and Namibia, but Malawi still stands as the worst affected.

Indian Muslims say no to condom machines

CHENNAI, India (Reuters) - Plans to install 500 condom vending machines in the capital of one of India's worst HIV/AIDS-affected states have angered Muslim groups so much they have taken to the streets to protest a "condom culture".

Critics of the plan by the Tamil Nadu government and India's National Aids Control Organization to put 500 machines in the capital of Chennai and 1,000 more across the state later say it would degrade women and corrupt the young.

"We must fight AIDS, but these machines at public places will only promote sex outside marriage among the younger generation," said M.H. Jawahirullah, who heads Tamil Nadu's largest Muslim group, the Muslim Munnetra Kazhagam (Muslim Progressive Party).

Over 200 Muslim women, many in veils, hit the streets of Chennai waving placards denouncing the plan and shouting: "Don't ruin our culture, Remove these machines."

"The government is spreading condom culture through these machines under the pretext of fighting AIDS," Fatheema Jalal, convenor of the Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, a Muslim group, told the rally.

"By this, our society will get more permissive and our youth will be ruined," she added.

India has more than 5 million HIV/AIDS sufferers, second only to South Africa. But efforts to combat the spread of the disease have come up against deeply conservative traditions.

A popular south Indian actress was pelted with sandals, tomatoes and rotten eggs and hauled before a court in Tamil Nadu for saying recently it was okay for women to have sex before marriage, as long as it was safe sex, and that men should not expect their brides to be virgins.

While rejecting claims by some Muslim leaders that condoms were un-Islamic, Jawahirullah said his party would also start protests if the machines were put in place.

Hu handshakes mean mockery for China AIDS victims