PESHAWAR, Sept 24: Donor organisations have warned the government that HIV/AIDS could spread rapidly if it failed to make a law allowing the UN and other organisations to work with certain high-risk populations.

A UN official said: “The government should make laws allowing it to work with the high-risk population otherwise it would spill over the general population.”

He said it was difficult for the government to work with these groups because by law they were illegal and socially and religiously it was difficult to convince the people.

He said as the existing law did not allow the government to ask sex workers to adopt safe sex practices and persuade drug users to use new syringes it was difficult to stem the tide of the ailment. The government is left with the option of selecting civil society organisations or NGOs to work with high-risk groups. In Pakistan, the NGO sector has always remained weak.

A senior UN official said: “Therefore, the response to such interventions would not be successful until and unless we strengthen NGOs and CBOs and even the society itself so that a breathing space is given to these high-risk groups and they are provided with preventive services.

“This will allow them to come forward and test themselves for HIV, and use preventive measures in order to contain the spread of infection among them.”

The UN official said: “Now the question is should we give services to these groups who are sinful, bad for the society? Well, if we don’t give them services, they will still continue their services because prostitution will never go away as far as the demand is there, resulting in risky behaviour and spread of infection into the general population.” Another official at the provincial Aids Control Programme said that lack of training among NGO workers had adversely been affecting the awareness campaign against HIV/AIDS.

He said that of the hundreds of NGOs working for HIV/AIDS prevention, 51 were registered with the NWFP Aids Consortium, which was working in collaboration with the National Aids Control Programme.

He said: “Most of the NGOs have limited capacity in counselling, monitoring and research. The NGOs receive huge funding from donor agencies, but they do little research on HIV/AIDS-related issues.

He said: “There is a need to work on vulnerable groups, including sex workers, drug users, out of school children and truck drivers. Most of the HIV/AIDS victims in the region belong to the tribal areas where NGOs do not have access due to security and the socio-cultural environment and misconceptions about NGOs.”

He said: “Recently, the people in Lakki Marwat district accused an NGO of spreading obscenity and held some demonstrations.”

He said the UN, however, was urging the government to put in place certain laws that could allow it to carry out the activities itself which were earlier being performed by the NGOs.

He said through a legislation, the government should allow socially acceptable interventions in specific communities.

In this connection, he said that laws should be implemented to pave the way for screening of passengers for HIV/AIDS at airports.

He said a recent study had shown that 80 per cent of the disease had been caused by deportees from Middle East countries.