Aids conference opens amid chilling warnings

July 11 2004 at 07:11AM

Bangkok - The largest global conference of Aids experts, activists and
leaders opens here Sunday amid chilling warnings about the growing
threat to swathes of the world's population.

Activists and agencies working to combat the disease are expected to
use the 15th International Aids Conference to demand more money to
fight the pandemic with new catastrophes threatening the world's most
populous continent Asia and Eastern Europe.

United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan on Sunday warned that
Asia's economic successes were threatened by the spread of HIV/Aids
after experts warned that only a three-year window remained for the
region's leaders to head off a crisis that could exceed anything yet seen
in sub-Saharan Africa.

The UN has warned that the effects could be disastrous if the virus takes
hold in India, China and Indonesia - the big three countries in the region
that represent some 40 percent of humanity.

'How you address this challenge will impact the very future of the region'
"Here in Asia, HIV/Aids stands at a turning point," Annan told delegates
to the second Asia-Pacific meeting on HIV/Aids in Bangkok. "But let us be
clear: how you address this challenge will impact the very future of the
region.

"In recent decades, more people have escaped from poverty in Asia and
the Pacific than in any other part of the world, and more than in any
previous time.

"These gains have impressed the whole world. You must cherish, and
carefully nurture them. Above all, you must not let them be reversed by
HIV/Aids."

More than 20 million people have died of AIDS since the condition was
first detected among a group of US homosexuals in 1981.

Around 38 million people are infected with the human immunodeficiency
virus (HIV), which wrecks the immune system and leaves the body
vulnerable to opportunistic diseases such as tuberculosis, cancer and
pneumonia.

Two thirds are in sub-Saharan Africa, a continent steamrollered by
stigma, official indifference, ignorance and poor resources, but Asia and
Eastern Europe are seen as the new key battlegrounds.

China's Premier Wen Jiabao warned Saturday that Aids has spread to
every level of Chinese society, after the UN said it was worried that the
country could see 10 million people infected with HIV within six years.

"These last few years Aids has spread very quickly over a vast area,
causing serious epidemics in some areas," said Wen, who was quoted
by the People's Daily on Saturday, the mouthpiece of the ruling
Communist Party.

China currently has 840 000 people with HIV, according to the report,
only 0,1 percent of the population, but the UN fears that the conditions
are ripe for numbers to surge.

However, Wen was applauded last year by shaking hands with an Aids
patient in an attempt to break entrenched stigma.

The six-day conference opens later Sunday with a ceremony that will
include performing Thai elephants and a candlelight memorial to show
solidarity for people with HIV and Aids.

Before the opening, Aids campaigners hope to muster thousands of
people later for a protest to demand a better deal for poor countries.

Elder statesman Nelson Mandela is the undoubted star guest among up
to 20 000 expected to attend the event that is held once every two
years. The conference will also showcase the latest research on the
syndrome.

The overarching theme in Bangkok is "Access for All" and seminars,
workshops and poster presentations will put the spotlight on the plight of
women and children, the most vulnerable sectors of the population.

Contributions to fighting Aids have risen substantially in the past two
years and are likely to be more than $5-billion in 2004.

But they are still running woefully short of what is needed with an
anticipated $20-billion estimated to be needed by 2007, UNAids said.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has set a target of giving three
million poor people access to antiretroviral drugs by the end of 2005, but
it is behind schedule with the tally currently around 440 000.

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