Afghan Health Ministry Determined to Stop Spread of HIV Virus

Text of report by state-owned National Afghanistan TV on 26 May

[Presenter] The Public Health Ministry has allocated 1.6m dollars for the prevention of AIDS over 30 months.

My colleague Mohammad Naem Zahed has more.

[Correspondent] The contract on the project was signed by Sayed Mohammad Amin Fatemi, the minister of public health, and a representative of the US Johns Hopkins University in Kabul today.

Speaking to journalists about the contract, Sayed Mohammad Amin Fatemi said: The HIV virus is lower among the general population, like 0.5 per cent. It is 3.0 per cent among injecting addicts. We have so far had 435 positive cases of the virus. There are around 2,500 HIV and AIDS cases throughout the country.

As part of the contract signed to maintain the low level of HIV AIDS virus, the World Bank has donated 10m dollars to the Public Health Ministry, 1.6m of which will be spent to control the fatal and dangerous virus in the coming 30 months.

[Sayed Mohammad Amin Fatemi, minister of public health] You should be assured that we are trying to maintain the low level of HIV AIDS in the country.

[Correspondent] According to the minister of public health, the number of HIV AIDS cases has so far been low in Afghanistan, but the three decades of war, poverty, illiteracy, internal and external migration, poppy cultivation, illegitimate sexual relations, and the transfusion of unsafe blood have sped up the spread of the virus in Afghanistan.

Originally published by National Afghanistan TV, Kabul, in Dari and Pashto 1530 26 May 08.

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