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10 million condoms, no takers
31/05/2007 07:08 - (SA)
Algiers - Algeria has 10 million free condoms to distribute but there are no takers, a senior medical official in the conservative Muslim country said on Wednesday.
"In Algeria, where Aids spreads mainly through sexual contact, 10 million free condoms are waiting in warehouses of the national pharmacy but there are no takers," said Mohamed Mesbah.
Some 19 000 of this north African country's 33 million people - 0.05% of the population - live with Aids, according to the UN agency UNAids.
Algerian authorities offer dramatically lower estimates. At the end of last year, it said there were 746 Aids cases and 2 175 people living with HIV.
After experts began talking about the benefits of condoms as barriers to spreading HIV/Aids, the government began soliciting imams to preach about the virus and the risks of unprotected sex during Friday prayers.
They face an uphill task. Many Algerians in television interviews claimed Aids can be transmitted simply by being in contact with someone who had it. Others, swayed by hard-line clerics, argue the virus aims to punish sexual deviants, including homosexuals.
A striking 40% of Algerian youth know "nothing about Aids", nor about how to prevent it, according to an official survey published in November.
- AFP
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