Asian drug users need more HIV prevention help

Source: Reuters

By Ben Blanchard

BEIJING, May 14 (Reuters) - Asian countries need to wake up to the threat of HIV transmission via intravenous drug use and spend more money on needle exchanges and other programmes or risk a rapid rise in new cases, a U.N. health official said on Monday.

Around one-third of new infections worldwide, excluding sub-Saharan Africa, are from injected drug use.

Asia has about 6 million users, and most new HIV cases are blamed on dirty injecting equipment, according to the United Nations.

But less than one-tenth of Asian users have access to prevention services, UNAIDS Asia Pacific Regional Director Prasada Rao told Reuters in an interview.

"If you look at comprehensive interventions, which means giving the option of both needle exchange and drug substitution, I think very few countries are doing it," he said by telephone from a conference in the Polish capital Warsaw.

"They have to prioritise interventions among intravenous drug users and the aim is for at least 80 percent coverage by 2010," Rao added.

"That requires enormous scale up in terms of resources and also in creating an environment where drug users can come out and access these services. Because in most of these countries they are still criminalised, and police raid them and catch them.

"It needs a change of attitude and a change of legislation relating to drug use. Because most often they don't distinguish between the supplier of drugs and the ultimate victim who is the user," he said. (...)

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