Students to establish anti-AIDS foundation

Students to establish anti-AIDS foundation

JAKARTA (JP): Senior high school students in the city plan to
establish a forum for exchanging ideas about means of preventing
the spread of the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS).

The plan was agreed upon on Wednesday night during a
discussion sponsored by the Pelita Ilmu Foundation (YPI), which
is involved in the fight against AIDS.

The discussion featured health experts Dadang Hawari, Noorwati
and Thoyib Muharam, who talked about reproductive health and the
prevention of AIDS.

"The forum will be named 'Students Care about AIDS'," YPI
activist Usep Solehudin told The Jakarta Post yesterday.

YPI has provided training to 517 students from 248 senior high
schools throughout the city and 160 teachers regarding AIDS
prevention. They, in turn, have passed on their knowledge about
AIDS and the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) to their
colleagues, Usep said.

Providing information about the spread of AIDS and
reproductive health generally to young people was the
foundation's main concern, he added.

"Students are encouraged to share their opinions about sex and
reproduction, topics which parents and teachers generally still
consider taboo," he said.

The spread of HIV has become a matter of national concern in
Indonesia. The government has formed a special board in charge of
coordinating efforts to curb the spread of the incurable disease.

Official data released by the Ministry of Health shows that 75
Indonesians have full-blown AIDS and at least 234 others have
tested positive for HIV. Forty-four of the AIDS cases and 57 of
the HIV cases were discovered in Jakarta.

The data also shows that 50 percent of people with AIDS/HIV
are aged between 20 and 29 years.

HIV, which first made headlines in 1980, is commonly
transmitted through the exchange of bodily fluids, the sharing of
syringes and blood transfusions.

"All over the world, three people catch HIV every minute,"
said Dadang Hawari, a health expert from the University of
Indonesia, Jakarta.

Many young people are ignorant about AIDS and yet many of them
have sexual relations before they are married, Thoyib Muharam
said.

He said that a recent survey he had conducted showed that most
customers of brothels were young people. "There is every reason
for the anti-AIDS campaign to target young people," he added.

Meanwhile, Hawari insisted that the only way to prevent
HIV/AIDS was the practice of safe sex and having only one sexual
partner.

He said that using condoms could not, by itself, guarantee
that someone would not be infected with HIV. "The healthy, safe
and responsible way to have sex is to get married and have one
steady partner, instead of wearing condoms," he said. (29)