Pubdate: Thu, 14 Jun 2007
Source: Daily Times (Pakistan)
Copyright: 2007 Daily Times
Contact:  http://www.dailytimes.com.pk
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2893
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin)

'HIV RATES ON THE RISE IN IRAN'

TEHRAN: HIV infection rates in Iran are increasing rapidly due both 
to a growing inflow of cheap heroin from Afghanistan and more 
sexually transmitted cases, according to a senior United Nations official.

Christian Salazar, the world body's coordinator on HIV in Iran, 
praised the country's "progressive and pragmatic" efforts in fighting 
the virus that causes AIDS, including a programme to hand out clean 
needles to drug addicts in prisons. But he said the Islamic Republic 
now faced new challenges to contain a disease that risked becoming 
more common among other sections of its 70 million population.

"Basically all the indicators for a quick advancement of the virus 
are there," he told Reuters in an interview on Tuesday. "We are 
worried about the trend." With Iran straddling a key heroin smuggling 
route from the opium fields of neighbouring Afghanistan to the West, 
injecting drug users remained the main risk group, but sexual 
transmission was also on the rise.

Salazar, who heads the UN children's fund UNICEF in Iran, said there 
was a need to raise general awareness among the public at large, even 
if it can be a sensitive issue in a country which bans sex outside 
marriage. "We see more and more sexual transmission as a driver of 
the epidemic," he said. "It creates the problem, so to speak, of how 
to talk about sex without talking about sex." Aiming to make AIDS 
"everybody's business," he said UNICEF increasingly sought to 
approach influential religious leaders. "They are okay with this," he 
said. "In comparison maybe to other religions, for example condom use 
or family planning is not a taboo issue."

Iran 'a leader': Iran is currently a low-prevalence country in terms 
of HIV infections, with a rate of about 0.16 pct of the adult 
population, below levels seen in other parts of the world. For 
example, it was 0.8 percent in North America in 2006. "But the 
infection rates are skyrocketing," Salazar said. "In the worst of 
cases we are moving towards one percent or even 1.8-1.9 percent of 
the population."
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman