HIV/AIDS Strategy of FPAN

HIV is a global health problem affecting all regions and countries around the world. There were about 40 million adult and 2.7 million children worldwide living with HIV at the end of 2001 (UNAIDS and WHO, http//www.aveart.org.html, 2002). During 2001 some 5 million people become infected with HIV and 3 million deaths from HIV/AIDS were recorded. Out of the total 42.7 million of HIV/AIDS infected people, 6.1 million estimated were living in Asia, where infections are increasing faster than anywhere else in the world (UNAIDS and WHO, http//www.aveart.org.html, 2002). Asia's vulnerability to AIDS owes evidently to high risk sexual behavior and sharing of needles among IDUs, high incidence of STI, gender inequities which heighten vulnerability of women and girls at many levels, poverty and low level of education and cultural taboos that surround sexual behavior. Information dissemination and negotiation for safer sex are yet a challenge. Highly mobile populations are more likely to engage in risk behaviors and act as breeding stocks transmitting HIV from one population to another. Cross boarder trafficking of girls and women and rapidly growing urbanization and high unemployment rates of youth might reinforce the transmission.