By
The Associated Press
BANGKOK, Thailand - Asia could outstrip chronically hit Africa in HIV/AIDS infections in the coming decade unless urgent action is taken to stop the spread, a U.N. official said yesterday.
"There are clear warning sings that the epidemic could escalate in many countries if urgent action is not taken," Kathleen Cravero, deputy executive director of UNAIDS, told a special session of the U.N. Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific on AIDS in Bangkok.
In 2000, more than 900,000 people were infected and 490,000 killed by HIV/AIDS in the Asia-Pacific region, Cravero said. About 3.9 million people were infected and 2.4 million died in Africa.
Globally, 36.1 million people are living with HIV/AIDS, about 70 percent of them in sub-Saharan Africa and about 18 percent in Asia and the Pacific.
But Cravero said that in the coming decade the epidemic could start increasing faster in Asia - home to half the world's population - than in Africa.
Infection rates were stabilizing in three or four African countries, although it wasn't clear whether this was due to prevention campaigns or populations reaching a saturation point in infections, she said.
"South Asia is already a hot bed of infection, the fastest growing epidemic outside sub-Saharan Africa, with an infection rate of 5 percent," Cravero told delegates.
Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand and parts of India already had epidemics that had spread beyond high risk groups like sex workers and intravenous drug users to the general population, she said.
Speaking at the special session, former Zambian president Kenneth Kaunda called for greater cooperation between Asia and Africa in fighting the disease.
"We must not allow mother Asia and mother Africa to be raped by HIV/AIDS," said Kaunda, whose son died of AIDS in 1986. Between 25 percent and 30 percent of Zambia's adult population are infected.
Kaunda, who ruled Zambia for 27 years until 1991 and is now a strong advocate of AIDS awareness, proposed a "south-south" dialogue that would help lessen the stigma of the disease.
