Indonesians not fully informed about AIDS

Indonesians not fully informed about AIDS

JAKARTA (JP): In spite of the media barrage of news on the
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, Indonesians still do not
fully grasp the dangers of the disease for which there is no
cure, a leading expert on AIDS said yesterday.

"AIDS in Indonesia is now at the same stage it was in Thailand
five years ago. This is very scary," Nona Poeroe Utomo, the
director of the Indonesian AIDS Foundation, told The Jakarta Post
yesterday.

Nona said questions she receives from the public on her
regular talk show for a private Jakarta radio station indicate
that ignorance of AIDS is not restricted to the poor, but is also
common among Indonesia's elite.

"They are asking the basic questions like whether or not AIDS
is contagious," she said, stressing that the target audience of
her talk show is young executives. "This shows that the level of
awareness about AIDS among the public is not where it should be."

She said the level of awareness among health authorities is
not much better.

The State Health Insurance Program, for example, excludes AIDS
because it is considered to be "self inflicted" although, like
cancer, it is a terminal disease.

In the regions, the situation is even worse than it is in the
capital.

Many doctors and nurses working at health community centers
still use disposable syringes more than once although they have a
sufficient stock supplied by the Ministry of Health.

"It's something they can be proud of, if at the end of the
year they could report to the authorities that they did not use
the entire number of syringes supplied to them," Nona said.

The AIDS Foundation was established last year with the
objective of raising the public's awareness of the Acquired
Immune Deficiency Syndrome and the Human Immunodeficiency Virus
(HIV) which causes AIDS.

Nona, a psychologist by training, who has her own counseling
practice, manages the day-to-day operations of the foundation.

A number of prominent figures lend credence to the
organization, including former health minister Adhiyatma, former
minister of environment Emil Salim, tycoon and chairman of the
Indonesian Red Cross Ibnu Sutowo, lawyer Kartini Mulyadi and
psychologist Sarlito Wirawan.

Government figures put the number of people having tested
positive for HIV in Indonesia at 256, but some officials and
experts believe the actual number is much higher, some suggesting
50,000. What is certain is that the number of people reported
with HIV has increased exponentially over the years.

The reality of the AIDS danger for Indonesia hit home last
June when President Soeharto established an inter-ministerial
committee to contain the spread of AIDS. The committee is chaired
by Coordinating Minister of People's Welfare Azwar Anas.

Azwar said the committee is drawing up a combat action plan,
pointing out that failure to act now could bring the number of
HIV infected people to 300,000 by the year 2000. This would
represent about $2 billion a year in medical costs.

Yesterday, Nona blamed the ignorance largely on the public's
lack of access to accurate information about AIDS and HIV.

She said the anti-AIDS campaign had been solely focused on a
specific target, for example the red-light districts, as if the
virus originated from there and would always remain there.

The truth is that the virus was brought in from outside, "but
we tend to forget that".

AIDS extension workers sent to the red-light districts must
also take part in the blame because they tend to give out minimum
information, thinking that the prostitutes, in view of their low
educational backgrounds, cannot absorb all of the facts and
advise.

Stop working

One typical piece of advise given to a prostitute who had
contracted the virus was that she should stop working because she
was not healthy, Nona said.

The key to the anti-AIDS campaign is information and education
and neither of these have been "adequate" in Indonesia, she said.

On the question of education for teenagers, she said the
endeavor has been made difficult in the absence of sex education
as a subject at schools. "It represents a big leap if they
suddenly have to be taught about AIDS from nothing."

The AIDS virus is transmitted either through sexual contacts,
infected syringes or contaminated blood transfusion.

Nona said another major obstacle to the anti-AIDS campaign in
Indonesia is the people's attitude towards the disease.

She also noted a tendency among Indonesians, including public
leaders, to dismiss lightly the dangers and implications by
stressing that traditional and religious values and the state
ideology Pancasila are shielding the nation from the catastrophe.

This kind of self denial is obstructing the campaign to drive
home the message about AIDS, she said. (emb)