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Mizzima: Manipur, still the victim



Manipur, still the victim of international drug trafficking

March 7, 2000
Mizzima News Group

Manipur with a population of 2 million (hardly 0.2% of India's total
population) is contributing more than 7% of India's total HIV positive
cases and it is third in rank in India after Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu
which contribute about 52% and 12% respectively of India's total HIV
positive cases. This was disclosed by Dr. Khomdon Singh Lisam, project
director of Manipur State AIDS Control Society yesterday in an interview
with Mizzima News Group.

The distinctive pattern of HIV infections in Manipur from the other two
states is that up to 70% of infection rates are found among injecting
drug users whereas in other two states, 80% are due to sexual
transmission.

"Manipur is having two epidemics now. One is the epidemic of drug abuse
and another is the epidemic of AIDS. Both of them were preceded by
illegal drug trafficking," said Dr. Khomdon Singh Lisam.

Manipur which has an international border of about 358 kilometers with
Burma became the victim of international drug smuggling as traffickers
found the route through this point of international border as a soft
route. Drug trafficking from Burma across the Manipur border reached its
explosive situation by 1984.

According to Dr. Lisam, in 1990, 100% of the HIV positives tested in the
state were among the injecting drug users and mostly heroine drug users.
Transmission was primarily through use of shared infected needles.
Quality testing of heroines, indulged by drug traffickers themselves
also contributed the epidemic as they traveled to and fro between Burma
and Manipur (India).

In 1997, 60 to 70 percentage of HIV infection cases were found among the
injecting drug users and the percentage has come down at present after
the successful intervention measures and AIDS campaigns done by State
Government and AIDS-NGOs in the state. Manipur is the first and only
state, which has a written State AIDS Policy in India.

Commercial sex workers are also vulnerable to HIV and represent a
relatively significant core group for transmission of the virus through
their clients in the state. Though there is no "red light areas" as such
in the state, Manipur State AIDS Control Society has identified three
areas where commercial sex workers are working. One is in the centre of
Imphal town where more than 200 commercial sex workers are already
identified by it, and the other two areas are in Churachandpur town and
Moreh town, both are closed to Burma's border.

"Most of the commercial sex workers working in Moreh comes from Myanmar
(Burma). They come to Moreh in the daytime, carry on their activities in
Moreh and return to Myanmar by night. More than 20% of commercial sex
workers in Moreh are HIV-infected. These are the girls and women who
often are visited by the injecting drug users who are HIV positives,"
said Dr. Lisam.

At the end of January 2000, Manipur had tested 9,705 HIV positive cases.
Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) has claimed that
India has the highest number of HIV infections in the world with some
3.7 million Indians having HIV or AIDS.