RI gives 1.44 million condoms to Cambodia

RI gives 1.44 million condoms to Cambodia

PHNOM PENH (Reuter): Indonesia donated 1.44 million condoms to Cambodia's Ministry of Health yesterday to help stem the spread of AIDS in the Southeast Asian nation.

Indonesian Ambassador Taufik Soedarbo, handing over the 1.44 million prophylactics, said his government was alarmed at the spread of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), which leads to the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS).

He said Jakarta believed the "modest donation" could help the government achieve its aim of ensuring 90 percent awareness of prevention measures in a country where HIV is believed to be spreading faster than anywhere else on earth.

The United Nations' World Health Organization estimated in June that 100,000 to 150,000 of Cambodia's 10.5 million people carried HIV and 1,500 to 2,000 had AIDS.

It had put the number of HIV carriers at 50,000 to 90,000 last November, just three months after estimating the number with the virus at 30,000.

Experts say sexual contact is the main cause of transmission, while Health Minister Chhea Thang said at yesterday's ceremony: "We need about five million condoms a year in Cambodia."

In Indonesia, activists are often reluctant to promote the use of condoms as a way to check the spread of AIDS, because many religious leaders have frowned upon it. Some Moslem leaders argued that promoting condoms amounted to "condoning promiscuity".

The Indonesian Council of Ulemas, for instance, has said the council neither accepts nor rejects the use of condoms either in the national family planning program or in the prevention of AIDS. Instead, it supports the use of condoms in certain cases. For instance, a man who is infected with HIV is obliged to wear a condom when having sex with his wife.