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AIDS threat stalks Ukrainian youth
By Tara FitzGerald
KIEV, July 12 (Reuters) - Don't use drugs, use condoms, lead a normal
lifestyle. A simple motto aimed by AIDS campaigners at the youth of Ukraine
but the message is failing to get through.
Long the scourge of African countries, the United Nations estimates that
ex-Soviet Ukraine has the fastest growing rate of HIV infection in Europe --
and has said that 1.5 million of its 49 million people could be affected by
the disease by 2010.
Since Ukraine's first HIV case was reported in 1987, the United Nations says
"the virus has risen to near epidemic proportions mainly within the injecting
drug-using community."
And aid workers believe it is not only the runaway rate at which the virus is
spreading but the fact that it is overwhelmingly attacking young people that
is of mounting concern.
"Approximately 90 percent of infection (in Ukraine) occurs in the 15-24 age
group," said Andrej Cima, Intercountry Programme Advisor for the United
Nations Joint Programme on HIV/AIDS, adding that it was no longer confined to
drug users.
"In Ukraine the epidemic is being driven by injecting drug users, and our
experience is that when it gets into the drug-using community it spreads very
fast," Cima said.
"We are now seeing an increase in non-drug users...so we are seeing a
spillover into the general community."
He said poppies growing in western Ukraine made access to drugs relatively
cheap and easy, and the fact that surveys show a large percentage of drug
users have casual sexual partners and practise unprotected sex was
compounding the problem.
The explosion in sex workers in the post-Communist era was also exposing more
and more people to HIV/AIDS.
TIP OF THE ICEBERG
Cima said that according to sero-monitoring data, as of May 1, 2001 there
were 67,844 reported cases of HIV in Ukraine and just 38,632 officially
reported cases -- 28,265 of those were injecting drug users.
The officially reported cases are those people who come back for treatment
after testing positive in sero-monitoring.
And these are just the people who have come forward for testing. Experts
believe the real number of Ukrainians affected could be as much as 10 times
higher.
"Some people want to put it out of their minds as they know they can live for
six to seven years without treatment," Cima said, explaining the discrepancy
in the figures.
Between January and April this year 2,032 new cases of HIV were reported.
The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which destroys the immune system and
leaves victims vulnerable to an array of opportunistic infections and
aggressive cancers, is the fourth leading cause of death globally. HIV causes
AIDS.
June 5 this year marked the 20th anniversary of the first public disclosure
of cases of the mysterious disease that became known as acquired immune
deficiency syndrome -- AIDS.
Walid Harfouch, the U.N. goodwill ambassador to Ukraine, says the fact that
there is not enough information available about HIV/AIDS and it is still a
taboo topic in Ukraine, are major contributing factors to its spread.
BREAKING TABOOS
"One of the biggest problems is that people don't want to report (possible
HIV) because they think they might be rejected by society, lose their jobs
and so on," Harfouch said.
"I know of cases where people were fired from their jobs after they found out
they were HIV positive and they now believe it was a big mistake to ever have
reported it."
His campaign focuses on spreading awareness among young people through pop
concerts, radio and television advertising, as well as supplying free condoms
at special events.
"Because I know that often young people, if they have the choice, will be
more likely to spend their two hryvnias (40 cents) on a beer rather than a
condom," Harfouch said.
"This is one of the direct ways in which we can prevent the spread of AIDS
among young people."
Cima also noted a lack of safe sex education in schools which he said the
government and aid groups were tackling.
But campaigners said they were cheered by the fact that Ukraine was one of
the four countries which had called for a special U.N. AIDS summit, which was
held in New York last month.
"This shows the government has taken a big step towards acknowledging the
existence of the problem," Harfouch said.
COSTLY TREATMENT
Another issue that Ukrainians have to face is the prohibitive cost of
treatment and its lack of availability for those who do come forward after
testing HIV positive.
The Institute of Epidemiology and Infectious Diseases of the Academy of
Medical Science of Ukraine -- the country's first dedicated HIV/AIDS clinic
-- is based in the capital Kiev and has around 20 residential places, as well
seeing a further 10-15 out-patients each day.
Housed in a beautiful old, if slightly shabby, building near the Pechersk
Lavra monastery, the clinic is funded by the Ukrainian government and several
non-governmental organisations.
Two boys stroll the grounds, smoking and chatting like any other teenagers
but in a window on the top floor a young girl peers out and quickly covers
her face with a scarf when anyone glances in her direction.
Igor Oleinik, a doctor at the clinic, says that the main problems they face
in trying to combat HIV/AIDS are a lack of financing, the "terrible technical
condition" of the ward and a lack of exact standards for diagnosis and
treatment.
And the U.N.'s Harfouch said the treatment that was available was still very
expensive.
"And it's not just treatment, there are also sometimes problems getting food
to them three times a day or blankets," he said.
"Most of the people there are in the last stages of the disease because they
can't get any treatment and because they have nowhere else to go."
22:04 07-11-01
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