AIDS Awareness Forum Held in Tajik North

Text of report by Tajik news agency Asia-Plus

Konibodom, 15 November: Participants in a seminar held at a youth centre in the town of Konibodom [in the north of Tajikistan] have discussed issues relating to raising HIV/AIDS awareness, ways of fighting against it and working out a complex of measures aimed at decreasing the demand for drugs.

The chairman of Konibodom’s committee for young people’s affairs, Shuhrat Ortiqov, told an Asia-Plus correspondent that the seminar had been organized jointly with the Konibodom AIDS prevention centre as part of AIDS awareness month.

“More than 60 activist girls from a youth movement, doctors and psychologists discussed the fight against HIV/AIDS and drug addiction among young people and teenagers,” he said.

The manager of an HIV/AIDS prevention programme, Inoyat Hakimova, said that with the growing number of labour migration not only the migrants themselves but also their family members are at increased risk of being infected with this disease.

According to the centre, there are currently about 16,000 residents of Konibodom abroad.