NEW WOE BEFALLS AFGHANS: AIDS

Geography, Migration And Heroin Industry Put Population At Risk

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Sitting on his father's lap, the 18-month-old
was oblivious to the infection in his veins.

But his father, a burly farmer, knew only too well. It was the same
one that killed his wife four months ago, leaving him alone with four
children. The man started to cry.

"When my wife died, I thought, well, it is from God, but at least I
have him," he said. "Then I learned he is sick too. I asked if there
is medicine and the doctors said no. They said, 'Just trust in God."'

Cloistered by two decades of war and then the strict Islamic rule of
the Taliban, Afghanistan was long shielded from the ravages of the
AIDS pandemic. Not anymore.

HIV and AIDS have quietly arrived in this land of a thousand
calamities. It remains almost completely underground, shrouded in
ignorance and stigma as the government struggles with the help of
American and NATO forces to rebuild the country in the face of a new
offensive by Taliban insurgents.

The father of this boy, the youngest Afghan known to have HIV, agreed
to speak to a reporter only if their names and other details were
omitted. He has not even told his family what his son has. He said he
believed that his wife contracted it through blood transfusions in
Pakistan years ago.

The few surveys that exist suggest that Afghanistan has a low
prevalence of HIV--only 69 recorded cases, and just three deaths. Yet
health officials warn that the incidence is certainly much higher.

"That figure is absolutely unreliable, even dangerous," said Nilufar
Egamberdi, a World Bank consultant on HIV/AIDS. The World Health
Organization has estimated that 1,000 to 2,000 Afghans are infected,
but Egamberdi said even that was "not even close to reality."

Dr. Saifur Rehman, director of the National AIDS Control program in
the Ministry of Health, agreed. Afghanistan, a deeply religious and
conservative country--sex outside marriage is against the law--may
still be less at risk of the spread of the disease than other places.

But international and Afghan health experts warn that it faces the
additional vulnerabilities of countries emerging from conflict: lack
of educational and governmental services, mass movements of people
and a sudden influx of aid money, commerce and outsiders.

Geography and migration make Afghanistan particularly susceptible. It
is surrounded by countries with the fastest-growing incidence of AIDS
in the world: Russia, China and India. Other neighbors, Pakistan and
Iran, have high levels of drug addiction and a growing number of HIV
infections, experts say. And rates of drug addiction are rising in
Afghanistan, with its booming opium and heroin trade.