Thu Jul 11,10:37 AM ET
BARCELONA (Reuters Health) - The HIV ( news
- web
sites) epidemic in the former Soviet Union is growing faster than anywhere
in the world and threatens to spread from injecting drug users into the
wider population unless action is taken, researchers said on Thursday.
About 28 million of the 40 million people infected with HIV worldwide
are currently in Africa, but experts warn that the number of cases in Asia
and Eastern Europe could explode in coming years.
"From a small number of cases in 1995, HIV infections have grown so
quickly that an estimated 1 million people in the former Soviet Union are
infected with HIV--more than in the US [на
самом деле в США 1/3 млн больных СПИДом]," Dr. Anna Shakarishvili
from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ( news
- web
sites) told reporters at the International AIDS ( news
- web
sites) Conference.
At present, 90% of HIV-infected people in former Soviet states are injecting
drug users, but Shakarishvili and colleagues from the Russian Association
for Sexually Transmitted Infection Prevention now report worrying signs
of an epidemic among sex workers and the homeless that threatens to spread
further through heterosexual sex.
The researchers studied 400 non-drug using men and women at homeless
detention centers in Moscow and found that 1% were HIV positive, compared
with just 0.18% in the general population. (исследование
впечатляет)
Thirty percent were infected with sexually transmitted diseases like
chlamydia and gonorrhea, which increase the risk of becoming infected with
HIV.
Over 64% of men and 40% of women in the study said they did not use
a condom the last 10 times they had sex, Shakarishvili added.
In another study, the researchers looked at HIV rates and risk-taking
among 190 women who exchanged sex for money or other commodities, only
21% of whom considered themselves as sex workers. (кто это
?)
Of these women, 2.8% were HIV positive and around 70% had one or more
sexually transmitted disease.
The women had an average of 168 partners in the past year, 1% took opiate
drugs and 5% took cannabis. Ninety percent said they used condoms, 63.2%
practiced oral sex and 15.8% had anal sex.
"This research shows marginalized women are at significant risk through
heterosexual sex," Shakarishvili said. "Without intervention, the epidemic
could spread more widely to the general heterosexual population through
commercial sex work."
комент: далеко не у каждого инфицированного развивается
собственно СПИД + любопытно, что сообщение о ситуации в бывшем СССР даёт
американский Сидиси = где Покровский ?