Drug-related HIV/AIDS cases on the rise in south

Injecting drug use, fuelled by illicit drug trafficking, is increasing the number of HIV/AIDS cases in southern Uzbekistan, particularly in areas bordering Tajikistan, health officials say. Aknazar Pardaev, the head of the Epidemiological Department of the AIDS Centre in the southern Uzbek city of Karshi, capital of Kashkadarya province, told IRIN that HIV/AIDS was on the rise in the area with injecting drug usage being the main mode of transmission. According to the official statistics, 46 confirmed cases have been registered among the residents of Kashkadarya province as of February 2004. Four cases were registered in 2001, five in 2002, while in 2003 that figure rocketed to 37. The highest rate of HIV infections was in Karshi city, namely 34 cases. There have been two HIV/AIDS related deaths since 1990. However, Pardaev said that the real number could be higher given that they were expecting test results from Tashkent on 60 unconfirmed cases. "We have preliminary tests here and then send them to Tashkent. There is a lack of [necessary] chemicals, which are imported. This makes it impossible for doctors to address issues immediately," he explained. Meanwhile, the issue has become even worse in neighbouring Surkhandarya province. "We have started registering the growth of the infection since 2000. Before that we had only three cases," Raisa Abuziyarova, the head of the epidemiological department at the provincial AIDS Centre, told IRIN in Surkhandarya. The recent data provided by the Surkhandarya AIDS Centre stated that in 2001 the number of infected people in the province was 30, another 37 cases were registered in 2002 and 47 new cases in 2003, bringing the total number of people infected to almost 120. However, the actual number could be much higher as there were 90 unconfirmed cases awaiting final testing in Tashkent. "Nine of the identified people have died, 49 are imprisoned and the rest are under control in district and local hospitals," Abuziyarova explained, adding that 86 percent of those registered as HIV-infected were injecting drug users and over 90 percent of them were men aged between 20 and 35. Abuziyarova cited drug-trafficking as the root cause of the problem, adding that there were more infected people in the areas lying on the trafficking route. "There is a higher level of cases along the Tajik-Uzbek border," she highlighted. "For instance, there are 32 HIV-infected people in Uzun district, 40 in Denus, and 11 in Jarkurgan district, while there are 19 HIV-infected people in Termez city, capital of Surkhandarya province," she explained, naming the border settlements. According to government statistics, in 2000 there were 154 HIV/AIDS cases in Uzbekistan, home to some 25 million, while in 2001 that figure was 479. In 2002, the number of cases doubled and reached 981. It doubled again in 2003, when there were 1,936 HIV-positive people in Central Asia's most populous nation.