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)