HIV/AIDS cases 'soar in Indonesian province'

JAKARTA (AFP) — The number of HIV/AIDS cases in Indonesia’s South Sulawesi province has more than doubled since 2006 due to an increase in intravenous drug use, a health ministry official said Thursday.

The provincial health office recorded 1,260 HIV/AIDS cases in 2006-2007 compared to 583 from 1996-2005, local official Raden Muliati told AFP.

“The increase during the last few years is due to the rising level of drug use in the province,” she said, adding that some 70 percent of cases were contracted through the use of dirty needles. Indonesia has the fastest-growing HIV/AIDS infection rate in Southeast Asia, according to the United Nations.

Indonesia had recorded a total of 11,868 cases of AIDS as of March this year, compared to 6,987 in 2006 or an increase of 69.8 percent in just two years, health ministry figures show. One of the worst-hit regions of the country is the eastern province of Papua, where 1,553 cases of AIDS had been recorded by the end of 2007.