Hotels told to post AIDS stickers

Hotels told to post AIDS stickers

JAKARTA (JP): In a bid to help reduce the number of victims of
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) in the country, the
Ministry of Health called on hotel owners throughout Indonesia
yesterday to post labels containing warnings of the danger of the
disease.

A top health official told journalists on Tuesday, moments
after meeting with the Association of Hotel and Restaurant Owners
on the resort island of Bali, that such a warning is timely and
necessary in the wake of the increasing number of victims of AIDS
worldwide.

Director General for the Prevention and Elimination of
Contagious Diseases, Hadi Maryanto, said that by the end of last
year, there were some 20 million people worldwide who were
infected by AIDS or tested HIV positive.

Of the 20 million, around 3.5 million were found in the South
and Southeast Asia regions, including Indonesia, Hadi said,
adding that the number of victims in those two regions have
increased markedly compared to Europe. He did not elaborate.

Official records show that, up to last November, there were
360 people who had been infected with the disease in Indonesia,
55 of whom have died.

"There is nothing wrong with posting labels containing the
warnings in hotel rooms instead of providing the guests with
condoms," Hadi said, stressing the need for hotel owners to put
the warnings in their hotel rooms.

Suggestions made earlier by certain government officials on
the provision of condoms for hotel guests have been criticized by
Moslem religious leaders as a disguised encouragement to hotel
guests to commit illicit sexual intercourse.

Noting that Indonesia has never promoted sex tourism, Hadi
said that suggestions on condoms in hotel rooms were actually
aimed at preventing the spread of the deadly disease by either
the prostitutes or their customers.

Hadi was quoted by the Antara news agency as saying that it is
important to post warnings of the danger of AIDS because "the
prostitution industry can never be eliminated on earth". (16)