DOHA: As seven fresh cases of AIDS were detected in Qatar last year that included a Qatari, health officials have recommended that younger people who frequently visit countries like Thailand should be checked for early detection of the HIV virus.
A seminar held on the deadly disease by the Supreme Council of Health (SCH) yesterday also came up with the recommendation that a national committee be set up to create public awareness about AIDS.
The panel, it was suggested, should encourage early marriage among the youth so they do not get involved in immoral relationships and fall prey to the deadly virus.
It was additionally recommended that those who apply to renew health cards should also be made to undergo tests for HIV.
Health officials said the seven new AIDS cases discovered last year take the total number of HIV-infected persons presently in Qatar to 98. From 1985 till date some 261 AIDS cases have been detected.
HIV positive persons account for a meager 0.02 percent of the country’s population, which is a negligible percentage and does not pose any serious threat to Qatar, a senior Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) official, Dr Abdul Latif Al Khaal, said.
The seminar was organised to mark the International AIDS Day. Al Khaal, however, added that global trends over the past decade showed a decline in the spread of the deadly disease.
Notwithstanding the small percentage of HIV patients in Qatar and a near-absent threat, the seminar underscored the need to set up a national committee to fight the killer disease and curb its spread.
It was suggested that anti-HIV awareness must start from school by making it part of the school curricula, and focus should simultaneously be put on youth clubs.
The panel would also be tasked with taking care of the HIV infected and make sure that they remain part of social mainstream because if they are neglected they could turn revengeful and spread the deadly virus.
An expert, Mamoon Mabeed, from the Social Rehabilitation Centre, told the symposium that Arab countries were falling prey to the killer HIV virus in a big way as the disease had been spreading alarmingly.
He said an incredible half-a-million people in the Arab world were inflicted by AIDS and that only 13 percent of them had access to treatment.
Another expert, Dr Allauddin Alwan, director of the World Health Organisation (WHO), Middle East, said that the problem was that people don’t come forward for medical check-ups so those with HIV virus cannot be treated.
The Peninsula
