প্রকাশ: 03/04/2022
Sixteen-year-old Raihan (not real name) used to live in the
city's Mohammadpur area. He is reading in class X. His father is a businessman
by profession. But, Raihan becomes addicted. He used to take drugs through
veins. Later, he was diagnosed with Aids.
According to Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS),
Bangladesh has, so far, around 14,000 patients of AIDS, the most advanced stage
of HIV infection. Though the number is low, the country is at high risk because
of neighbouring countries which have higher transmission rates and easy access
to drugs.
Of them, around 84 percent came under treatment. The
disease, however, claimed 205 lives in 2020, taking the total death toll to
1,588.
Bangladesh first detected HIV positive case in 1989. The
first AIDS patient is still alive and physically sound. He regularly
communicates with the HIV treatment programme.
According to a report of UNICEF, published on November 29
last year, about 3.60 lakh adolescents are projected to die of Aids-related
diseases across the world between 2018 and 2030. About 76 teenagers are
projected to die every day if any additional allocation is made in preventing
HIV, screening and treatment project. Currently, two adolescents are being
infected by HIV in every two minutes.
The UNICEF urged all concerned to strength different
programmes including treatment and prevention to reduce infection and death
rate of adolescent.
The report titled 'Child, HIV & AIDS: World of 2030'
said 270,000 children and adolescents are projected to become newly infected
with the virus annually. But the number of death of adolescent will be reduced.
56,000 children and adolescents are projected to die from AIDS-related causes
annually.
It said the number of newly infected children will be
reduced by 2030. But the rate of newly infected HIV adolescent between 10 years
and 19 years will be reduced on 29 percent. And the death rate under 14 years
of old children will be reduced 57 percent.
According to the latest statistics, a large portion of the
total AIDS patients in Bangladesh are Rohingya population. The officials
concerned laid emphasis on screening at the country's all air, sea, and land
ports to prevent the spread of the deadly virus.
They said India and Myanmar have different communications
with the businesses and common people of Bangladesh. So, awareness should be
raised among the citizens besides the government and non-government initiatives
to this end.
Assistant Professor of Shaheed Suhrawardy Medical College
Hospital, Dhaka virologist Dr Zahidur Rahman said, "Bangladesh is a
country of low prevalence in case of HIV infection. But it is at risk for
various reasons. We have borders with two countries (India and Myanmar). Both
are at high risk. There are also a few lakh Rohingyas in the country."
Mentioning people coming to Bangladesh from the two
neighbouring countries, he said it is urgent to launch HIV screening tests at
air, sea and land ports.
"This test will not cost much, and it may take 10
minutes to conduct the same by kit. The United Nations have huge idle money
which we can use for HIV screening," he added.
According to the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS),
around 28.05 percent of women are not informed about AIDS but 71.05 percent are
aware of at least one carrier of the disease. The awareness rate among the
women about all the spreaders rose to 36 percent, 7 percent more than that of
2016.
The government agency thinks the risk of AIDS transmission
among women is rising as the awareness did not grow at the desired level.
The data provided by the National AIDS/STD Control (NASC)
Programme of the Directorate General of Health Services said a total of
12,91,069 samples were tested from November 2020 to November 2021 to detect
HIV/AIDS. The same was around 13,32,589 in the previous year. Out of the newly
729 HIV-infected people in last year, men are 420, women 210, transgenders 12.
Of them, Rohingyas are 188 (account for 26%), common people
186 (26%), abroad returnees and their families 144 (20%), people who take drugs
through injection 61 (8%), female sex workers 17 (2%), homosexuals 67 (9%),
male sex workers 53 (7%) and transgenders 12 (2%), the data showed.
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