Nine in 100,000 Sarawakians have AIDS, Karim warns figure higher if unreported cases taken into account
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| Abang Sardon (left) presents a memento to Abdul Karim. |
KUCHING: Incidences of Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) infection jumped three-fold over the past 10 years in Sarawak.
Quoting statistics, Youth Development (Urban) Assistant Minister Datuk Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah revealed that the number of cases increased from 3.3 per 100,000 people in 2003 to nine in 2013.
“In addition, reports also showed that the main cause of HIV infections in Sarawak was due to unprotected sex, which is different from states in Semenanjung Malaysia,” he said.
“And 74 per cent of the identified cases were aged between 30 and 49, which is during the most productive years of human beings that should be focused on developing self, career and family as well as contributing to society and nation,” he added.
Although the figure may seem small, he warned that this issue should not be taken lightly because the data did not include unreported cases.
Abdul Karim highlighted this at the #kuchingzeroHIV with the Media talk organised in conjunction with Kuching Healthy City Project – Towards Zero HIV by Year 2020 at the Auditorium of Malaysia National Film Development Board (Finas) Sarawak Branch along Jalan Sultan Tengah here yesterday.
Jointly organised by the Information Department and Health Department, the project was part of Asean countries’ initiative under the Asean Work Plan IV for HIV from 2012 to 2015 in which Malaysia has made a commitment to achieve ‘Asean Cities Getting To Zero’ Project.
