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AIDS blossoms in the Golden Triangl



                                  AIDS blossoms in the Golden Triangle
                                  05:50 a.m. Oct 27, 1997 Eastern

                                  By Jonathan Thatcher

                                  MANILA, Oct 27 (Reuters) - HIV
infections,
                                  already threatening to hit Asia on a
massive scale, are
                                  growing fastest in some of its least
accessible regions
                                  around the notorious Golden Triangle, a
study
                                  released on Monday showed.

                                  ``Mobile populations in areas such as the
 Golden
                                  Triangle...are highly vulnerable to HIV
infection,'' the
                                  Monitoring of AIDS Pandemic (MAP) network
 said,
                                  referring to the region infamous as the
world's chief
                                  source of opium.

                                  MAP, which groups more than 100 HIV and
AIDS
                                  experts from 40 countries, issued its
findings during a
                                  conference in Manila on the human
immunodeficiency
                                  virus, which can lead to acquired immune
deficiency
                                  syndrome.

                                  The Golden Triangle comprises parts of
Burma,
                                  Thailand and Laos but the report said
also affected
                                  were nearby border regions of India and
China as
                                  well as the Mekong delta in Cambodia and
Vietnam.

                                  It pointed to three factors behind the
rise -- unsafe
                                  sex with prostitutes, injected drugs and
increased
                                  mobility of the population.

                                  ``Most distinctive are the HIV epidemics
exhibiting
                                  high and increased prevalence...and high
and
                                  increasing incidence...in Cambodia...and
in Myanmar
                                  (Burma),'' it said.

                                  While in Cambodia it was mostly from
unprotected
                                  sex with prostitutes, in Burma the spread
 of the
                                  disease has been boosted by users of
injected drugs.

                                  The use of shared needles by drug users
is a common
                                  source of HIV.

                                  In India, which has more HIV infections
than any
                                  other country in the world, the problem
is limited to
                                  specific areas.

                                  Almost 50 percent of known AIDS cases are
 in the
                                  state of Maharashtra, the of which is
Bombay.
                                  Another 22 percent are in Tamil Nadu in
southern
                                  India, the report added.

                                  The report follows warnings at the Manila
 conference
                                  that Asia could overtake Africa as the
region
                                  worst-hit by the HIV virus.

                                  The seven million Asians thought to carry
 HIV could
                                  double by the end of the century, a
United Nations
                                  official said.

                                  MAP Network co-chairman Daniel Tarantola
said it
                                  was crucial to collect more information
to assess the
                                  potential for large-scale epidemics.

                                  But while there was a danger of
underestimating the
                                  problem, overestimating it could prove
                                  counter-productive.

                                  ``Deceived by overstated predictions,
governments
                                  may turn their back and simply walk away
from
                                  emerging epidemics when the predicted
extensive
                                  spread of HIV in the population does not
become a
                                  reality,'' Tarantola said.

***Related Article

Full story
                                  Doctors: AIDS Vaccine May Have First
                                  Test
                                  03:54 p.m Oct 27, 1997 Eastern

                                  By Ruben Alabastro

                                  MANILA, Philippines (Reuters) - The
world's first
                                  mass test of a vaccine against the virus
that causes
                                  AIDS may be held in Thailand possibly as
early as
                                  2000, medical experts at an international
 AIDS
                                  congress said Monday.

                                  They said tests would be voluntary and
conducted
                                  among people most exposed to the danger
of
                                  acquiring AIDS, such as prostitutes and
intravenous
                                  drug users.

                                  ``There's a good possibility that the
first vaccine
                                  efficacy trial ever conducted in the
world will be
                                  conducted in Asia and specifically
Thailand,'' said Dr.
                                  Margaret Johnston, scientific director of
 the
                                  U.S.-based International AIDS Vaccine
Initiative
                                  (IAVI).

                                  An efficacy trial is intended to show if
the vaccine
                                  works on humans, Johnston said.

                                  She said it was hard to say exactly when
such a mass
                                  trial could be carried out because
initial tests on small
                                  groups, to find out how safe the vaccine
was, had not
                                  been completed.

                                  ``But if everything is safe and
everything works...the
                                  first efficacy trial could start in
Thailand perhaps in the
                                  year 2000, perhaps,'' she told a news
conference.

                                  ``That's going to require a lot of
factors...The trial
                                  itself will take three or four years so
we could have a
                                  vaccine in 10 years.''

                                  ``It will probably involve many thousands
 of people,
                                  high risk individuals...The numbers will
probably be in
                                  several thousands,'' Johnston said.

                                  IAVI is a private group of scientists and
 medical
                                  experts trying to develop a vaccine that
would
                                  immunize people against the Human
                                  Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) that can
lead to
                                  Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome
(AIDS).

                                  About 23 million people were estimated to
 be
                                  carrying the HIV/AIDS virus as of end
1996 and
                                  some experts said the number could double
 by 2000.

                                  No vaccine has been developed to combat
HIV or
                                  cure AIDS itself despite years of
research costing
                                  millions of dollars, experts said.

                                  World leaders have joined in the
anti-AIDS
                                  campaign. President Clinton in May called
 for the
                                  development of an AIDS vaccine within the
 decade.

                                  Prasert Thongcharoen, a Thai virologist
and director
                                  of the Collaborating Center on AIDS of
the World
                                  Health Organization (WHO), said his
country was
                                  willing to host the first anti-HIV
vaccine mass.

                                  Thailand, which has about 800,000 HIV
cases as of
                                  last year, is one of the countries
hardest hit by the
                                  epidemic.

                                  Prasert said many Thais were willing to
volunteer for
                                  such a trial.

                                  ``We could not wait for Western countries
 to do this
                                  for us. The problem (in) the West is less
 and less but
                                  not in our country, not in Asia,'' he
told Reuters.

                                  Disclosure about the proposed mass test
coincided
                                  with controversy over some AIDS trials
for pregnant
                                  women in Africa in which subjects
received only
                                  placebos and no drugs.

                                  The trials were designed to see if drug
treatments
                                  could stop pregnant women from passing on
 the HIV
                                  virus to their babies. Some groups
criticized the trials
                                  saying it was unfair to withhold
potentially life-saving
                                  therapy from anybody.

                                  Johnston said the mass trial would
involve dividing
                                  volunteers from high-risk sectors into
two groups
                                  which would be intensively counseled on
how to
                                  avoid the infection.

                                  One group would get the vaccine and the
other would
                                  not.

                                  ``You follow them over a period of years
and see if
                                  the group that got the vaccine have less
infections than
                                  the group that didn't get the vaccine.
Then you know
                                  that the vaccine works.''

                                  Johnston did not say if the two groups
would be told
                                  beforehand that one of them would not get
 the
                                  vaccine.

                                  A study released Monday showed HIV
infections,
                                  already threatening to hit Asia on a
massive scale,
                                  were growing fastest in some of its least
 accessible
                                  regions around the notorious
heroin-producing
                                  Golden Triangle.

                                  ``Mobile populations in areas such as the
 Golden
                                  Triangle...are highly vulnerable to HIV
infection,'' the
                                  Monitoring of AIDS Pandemic (MAP) network
 said,
                                  referring to the region infamous as the
world's chief
                                  source of opium.

                                  MAP, which groups more than 100 HIV and
AIDS
                                  experts from 40 countries, issued its
findings at the
                                  Manila conference.

                                  The Golden Triangle comprises parts of
Burma,
                                  Thailand and Laos but the report said
also affected
                                  were nearby border regions of India and
China as
                                  well as the Mekong delta in Cambodia and
Vietnam.

                                  It pointed to three factors behind the
rise -- unsafe
                                  sex with prostitutes, injected drugs and
increased
                                  mobility of the population.

//End//