AIDS in SE Asia linked to vice
AIDS in SE Asia linked to vice
MANILA (Agencies): The prevalence of AIDS in Southeast Asia
was linked to the number of men visiting prostitutes and the
number of clients a prostitute sees, researchers said here
yesterday.
The group, Monitoring the AIDS Pandemic, which is backed by
the United Nations and the U.S. Agency for International
Development, said it had studied the incidence of AIDS in
Myanmar, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, the Philippines and Thailand.
One of the researchers, Jim Chin, told an international AIDS
conference here that in Myanmar, Cambodia and Thailand the
disease had developed at an "explosive" rate.
He said that in the three countries, the number of clients
serviced by a prostitute was two to three times higher than that
of a prostitute in Indonesia, Laos or the Philippines, where
infections remained low.
The study also found that the percentage of sexually-active
males who visited prostitutes was higher in the three "explosive"
countries than in the low-prevalence countries.
Daniel Tarantola, a co-chairman of the study, said they needed
to collect more data on why behavior was different in the two
groups of countries.
AIDS, the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, is an incurable
disease spread by sexual contact and the sharing of body fluids
and syringes.
Tarantola said the behavior of intravenous drug users was
another important subject to study, but added that many of the
countries involved did not have enough information on their drug
users.
He said some countries do not even acknowledge they have large
numbers of injecting drug users until AIDS emerges in that group.
The group noted that in some countries like Thailand, AIDS
first emerged among intravenous drug users then spread to the
general population.
Prostitution
Meanwhile, a group of Asian prostitutes attending the AIDS
congress urged governments yesterday to recognize their
profession and said that being forced to work underground was
promoting the spread of AIDS.
The four women and one man, representing the Asia-Pacific Sex
Workers' Network, told a press conference that society should not
treat them like criminals but protect them from police
harassment, including arrest, assault and rape.
"We call on the delegates of the International Congress on
AIDS... to recognize that sex work is an occupation... to accept
it is the unsafe conditions at work rather than sex work itself
that causes risk of HIV infection," the group said in a
statement.
They launched the call at the end of a four-day international
AIDS conference in Manila to discuss how to curb the spread of
the disease in the Asia-Pacific region.
United Nations officials estimate that by last year up to
seven million Asians were carrying the human immunodeficiency
virus (HIV) which causes AIDS.
Global estimates of the infection stood at 23 million last
year. The number is expected to double by 2000, with probably
half of those infected being in Asia.
UN officials say heterosexual sex accounts for the majority of
the infections.
"We want to be able to work without being arrested," said Thai
bar girl Napaporn Soimalai, 29.
Napaporn said she was now a student at a Bangkok university
studying psychology, but continued to work as a prostitute to
support her family and her studies.
The group's spokeswoman Khartini Slanmah, a 34-year-old
Malaysian, said that by making prostitution illegal in many Asian
countries, governments were promoting the spread of AIDS.
Prostitution might be difficult to legalize throughout Asia
but it should be treated as ordinary work, she said.