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The numbers show all the madness. Just last year, 100,000 people in Russia were infected with HIV. More than half of them were addicts. And you do not treat them trashily in Russia. Even for a few grams of marijuana, you can go to jail. But in Russia, completely different is consumed. The country is considered the largest heroin market in the world.
Severe sanctions for drug addicts in Russia
Anyone caught drinking is threatened by something draconian. "What happens: they go to jail, maybe even get tortured, and then they are threatened with cold deprivation, which is the horror we see here," says Anna Dovbakh, director of the hospital. a Russian organization that supports drug addicts. Reduction is the technical term for this, it means something like limiting damage. For drug addicts, for example, it is very important to use clean syringes to prevent the spread of HIV. For this reason, many countries have started providing syringes for drug users, as in the Netherlands. Unthinkable in Russia. On several occasions, President Vladimir Putin made it clear that drug addicts are not needed here. He pursues them, says activist Dovbakh in Amsterdam, so she calls loudly: "Hunt the virus – not humans!"
Under this motto, several organizations from Eastern Europe and Central Asia joined forces. They no longer want to accept that the HIV epidemic can continue to spread unnoticed. And while Russia spends hundreds of millions of dollars a year on HIV treatment, the only question is: where is the money going?
Criticism: Russia sets wrong priorities in the fight against HIV
It does not seem to fit into prevention programs funded exclusively by funds from the Global Fund, that is, say from abroad. This year, however, funds from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Malaria and Tuberculosis for Russia are expiring – and then, in financial terms, with the protection and treatment of HIV, they are unclear. Anna Dovbakh criticizes that the wrong priorities are set: "All we spend on HIV prevention is wasted because people are locked up and then they will not receive treatment and will not be tested."
Similarly, Russian homobaduals feel. Although it is a relatively small group of infected people, the danger continues to increase, as it is virtually forbidden for them to show up in public life. As a result, gay life takes place in secret. "Of course, we do not go to the doctor, we do not protect ourselves, we are not tested and we are not treated for HIV," said Vitaly Djuma, who defends the rights of homobaduals in Europe. l & # 39; Is. A fifth of newly infected homobadual men. World AIDS Conference President Linda Gail Bekker of South Africa sends a message to politicians in Eastern Europe: we must act – and quickly. There are currently about one million people living with HIV in Russia – the number of unreported cases could be significantly higher.
Russia's prevention policy failed
People are not informed about the plague, so it is also pbaded on to those who do not use drugs. 43% of people infected with HIV are heterobadual. The Russian Orthodox Church has banned bad education lessons learned from textbooks and relies on abstinence. Thus, Russia's prevention policy, at least up to 600 million dollars a year, can be considered a failure. In addition, Russian President Putin has not even publicly mentioned the terms HIV and AIDS in the last decade.
Therefore, the president of the World AIDS Conference, Bekker, calls: "It must stop, he must see evidence, infections are increasing in his region, in his country!"
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