VIETNAM: Former US President Bill Clinton urges Vietnam to reduce fear and ignorance over HIV/AIDS

Former U.S. President Bill Clinton on Wednesday (December 6) tackled discrimination in Vietnam against people living with HIV and AIDS, urging its young citizens "to talk about it more" to reduce fear and ignorance of the disease. He met Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet on Wednesday and held a roundtable discussion with a group of young medical students and an activist who is infected with HIV/AIDS. With the Vietnamese president witnessing, Clinton signed a letter of agreement between the health ministry and his Clinton Foundation for an initiative that will extend treatment to a total of 1,200 HIV infected Vietnamese children by late next year. "We want to especially emphasise the commitments we are making to triple the number of children getting the anti-retroviral medicines almost immediately as soon as we can and then to continue until all the children in Vietnam who needed have access to the medicines," Clinton said at the signing ceremony. Vietnam, which has an estimated 280,000 HIV infections in a population of 84 million people, is fighting to stop the spread of its epidemic to the general population from "high-risk" groups such as injecting drug users and prostitutes. There are more than one hundred HIV-infected children being treated at the National Children's hospital, where the Clinton Foundation is also providing health care and medicines for children. The Communist-run Southeast Asian country's HIV/AIDS epidemic is less serious than neighbouring Cambodia and Thailand, but health authorities say the number of cases is rising rapidly at 100 new infections per day. The ruling Communist Party, international health groups and donors have worked in recent years to fight stigma and discrimination that leads to HIV positive people being denied employment or schooling. A new law comes into effect in January that includes anti-discrimination language. At a forum in Hanoi on Tuesday (December 5), young students from local universities got to share their views and hear those of Clinton on the HIV/AIDS situation in Vietnam. Clinton stressed the need for more testing and told the audience that 90 percent of HIV-positive people do not know they carry the virus and urged people to speak more freely about HIV/AIDS. "The more you talk about it the more people see flesh and blood human beings who are HIV positive who are good people and not frightening, and can be part of your common future, the more you are going to do well," Clinton said. Meanwhile Pham Thi Hue, a young HIV-infected woman working as a volunteer for the UN, talked about her experiences while living with the disease. She said she attempted suicide because of the discrimination she experienced. But she said she overcame the difficulties thanks to being more open and talking about her condition. "The more I participate in the social activities the more comfortable I felt. It's also good medicines that help me to gain good health like this," Hue said. The foundation opened its Vietnam office in July and this was Clinton's second visit to the country, part of a week-long Asian tour on Tsunami recovery and HIV/AIDS. In 2000 when he was still in the White House, Clinton became the first U.S. President to visit former war enemy, five years after the normalisation of relations. Last month, Clinton's successor President George W. Bush made a state visit. The Clinton Foundation says that since its inception three years ago, it has helped bring care and treatment to 500,000 people living with HIV and AIDS around the world.

ITN Source | December 7, 2006

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