December 2, 2003	Tuesday	Shawwal 7, 1424

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PESHAWAR, Dec 1: Doctors have urged the government to make arrangements at the airports to screen the blood of those who are being deported from the United Arab Emirates and other Middle East countries after being tested positive for HIV/AIDS to save other people from being infected.

“Two patients, including a woman, were tested positive for HIV in July last at a private laboratory of the city. The main cause of the spread of the killer epidemic is the deportation of the Pakistani workers from the UAE and other Middle East countries,” said a pathologist.

According to him, a woman, 34, was tested HIV positive on July 14 last. She belonged to Miranshah. Her husband had been deported to Pakistan one year back after being tested positive for HIV.

The pathologist said the lives of the wives and children of these patients remained at the razor’s edge because the patients did not care to avoid transmitting the ailment to their wives and children.

He said people did not come for HIV test but the “infected people visit doctors for other ailments”.

The same woman had an operation for miscarriage of baby in one of the city’s hospitals before being diagnosed as HIV positive. Later, her husband suggested to the doctors to carry out the HIV test of his wife that emerged positive. The pathologist said: “Such cases are also harmful for other patients who are being routinely operated upon in the same operation theatre.”

A case in point is the death of a young woman in Hayatabad township only last month. Her husband who had been a porter in Dubai had died last year of AIDS. He had been expelled from there after being tested positive for HIV. The lives of her three children are at stake, though the doctors maintain that they have not acquired the endemic yet.

There are scores of cases but the doctors concerned withhold the information due to social taboos, because the disease is caused mainly through unsafe sex practices.

According to pathologists, they had received some 20 cases of HIV positive since January, all of which had been deported from the UAE and other Middle East countries. The number of patients might be much higher but the patients avoid tests for fear that if tested positive relatives and friends would keep away from them.

“The people working abroad remain away from their homes for quite some time, and more often indulge in sex with professional sex workers from whom they get the deadly infection,” said a physician.

When these people visit the embassies in these countries in connection with the renewal of their visas, etc., they are tested for HIV. Those tested positive are deported straightaway without being allowed visiting the places they live or packing their luggage.

“This is extremely inhuman act on the part of the officials in these countries. They should formally inform the Pakistan government regarding the expulsion of the HIV positive patients so that other people can be protected from the disease,” said the physician.

According to him, every person arriving from abroad should be tested for HIV at the airports and the findings, if positive, should be passed on to their relatives, especially wives.

A health official, meanwhile told Dawn that the NWFP and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) had a total of 359 known HIV cases.

He said an amount of Rs2.8 billion had been sanctioned by the government to be spent over a period of five years on a sustainable campaign against HIV/AIDS in the country, of which the NWFP would receive Rs270 million.

Similarly, Unicef has allocated Rs2 million to be spent for the purpose of raising awareness among the people.

There are also complaints from the NGOs that the local hospitals are reluctant to admit the HIV/AIDS patients for symptomatic treatment, a charge vehemently denied by the health authorities.

Doctors also fear that most of the Afghan refugees who are settled abroad could also be the cause of the disease, because they usually visit the NWFP.

The long and porous Pakistan-Afghanistan border has been used by the Afghans without being checked by the authorities is a source of concern about the spread of AIDS.

The announcement of the Afghan health minister on the World AIDS Day last year that there were six confirmed cases, has further mounted the fears among the Pakistanis, especially of the NWFP and Balochistan which share border with Afghanistan.

Afghanistan has a long history of AIDS. “In early eighties, two students of Kabul University had been deported from Bulgaria after testing positive for HIV,” said Dr Fareed Bazgar, who heads an NGO — Orphan Refugee Aid (ORA). He said the World Health Organisation had also reported 10 cases of HIV from Khost, Paktia, Paktika, Jalalabad, Kabul and Herat provinces of Afghanistan last year.