(11/13/2010)
Based on data from Bali's Committee on the Prevention and Control of AIDS (KPA) there are an estimated 300 more infants under the age of 5 years infected with HIV/AIDS each calendar year in Bali. The children acquire the disease from their parents who are also infected with the disease.
Beritabali.com reports that further research carried out by KPA Bali show that around 1.2% of all pregnant women in Bali's capital city of Denpasar are deemed to be infected with HIV/AIDS.
A spokesman for KPA, Professor Nyoman Mangku Karmaya, told the press on Friday, November 12, 2010, that mothers who are infecting their newborn with HIV/AIDS generally hail for high risk groups of intravenous drug users or commercial sex workers.
Worried of a more widespread patterns of pandemic infection in the future, Karmaya said, "in reality, infections are mostly limited to pregnant women who once worked at cafes or who have been infected by husbands who are from high risk groups."
KPA also estimates that at least 25% of commercial sex workers in Bali are infected with HIV/AIDS.
Karmaya relayed the dire news that the number of new cases discovered each year in Bali has hit 840. On a cumulative basis, there are now some 3,700 known cases of HIV/AIDS in Bali. On the assumption that there are many more undiagnosed or unreported cases, the Bali Health Department estimates a total of 7,000 cases of HIV/AID on the island.
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