Manama, December 02: Bahrain has shown progress in public acceptance of AIDS/HIV patients within three years of the implementation of the UN five-year plan to improve their lives.
The manager of the National Sexually Transmitted Diseases Programme Dr Somaya Al Jowder told Khaleej Times on Tuesday on the occasion of the World AIDS Day that the main objective of the plan is to protect the health and human rights of all AIDS/HIV patients through easy access to treatment and integration into society.
She said that 18 new AIDS/HIV cases were discovered in 2009, including a five-years-old girl who got the disease through her infected mother.
Among adults, only one male got it through blood transfusion, while the rest contracted the virus through drug addiction and sexual relations.
Fifty non-Bahraini males and females who contracted the virus were deported, while there are 200 living Bahrainis who are under treatment.
“Although Bahrain is achieving marvelous accomplishments, we are working for further acceptance to AIDS/HIV patients and we are optimistic that we are moving in the right directions,” she said.
She highlighted that health authority pushes for legislations to combat illicit relationships and drug addiction to eliminate new AIDS cases in Bahrain.
“We had organised campaigns at a shopping mall to inform the public that AIDS couldn’t be transmitted by touching or associating with infected patients.”
Dr Al Jowder said that most of the adult AIDS patients got the virus from contaminated needles, so they chose such a fate, while children had been victimised for being subjected to short and hard lives.
Dr Al Jowder said that the first of its kind voluntary AIDS testing and Counselling Centre would enable health authority to have better control on the disease.
–Agencies