619 infected with HIV: Official

JAKARTA (JP): The number of HIV/AIDS-infected people in Indonesia increased by 17 last month to 619, an official said.

The health ministry's director general for contagious diseases control, Hadi M. Abednego, said that of the 17 cases reported, 12 were found in Riau, two in Jakarta, two in Bali and the last in East Java.

Carriers of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome have been recorded in 22 provinces across the nation. Jakarta has the highest number with 181 carriers followed by Irian Jaya with 155 and Riau with 69, he said.

Of the 619 infected people, 466 have been declared HIV positive while of the remaining 153 diagnosed with full-blown AIDS 84 have already died.

Most of those infected are men, with 393 reported cases.

Abednego said 421 were infected through unsafe heterosexual sex while 94 were infected through homosexual relationships.

Among the carriers were four infants who reportedly contracted the virus from their HIV-positive mothers.

Abednego admitted that the real figures could be 100 times greater than the current statistics.

"The government had stepped up its campaign against the spread of HIV/AIDS by a strategy of communication, information and education on family resistance, social issues, culture, religion and health, without discriminating the infected people," Antara quoted Abednego as saying on Friday. (09)