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By, IRIN PlusNews, April 2, 2007 Kenya - Ignorance and overwhelming poverty are making HIV/AIDS a growing problem in Kenya's northern provinces, with women hit particularly hard, health workers have said. Noor Sheikh Ahmed, an official at the HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted infections department of Northeastern Province, told IRIN-PlusNews that the number of cases in the four districts of Garissa, Mandera, Wajir and Ijara had doubled to 20,000 in the past two years, most of them women. "The [number of] HIV/AIDS patients are increasing at an alarming rate," he said. "People struggle to survive and risk their lives." HIV prevalence levels in the sparsely populated and predominantly Muslim province are the lowest in the country. A 2003 Demographic and Health survey found that less than 1 percent of people were HIV positive, but that awareness levels and misconceptions about AIDS persisted: only 30 percent of women believed HIV could be avoided. Kenya has a national prevalence of 5.9 percent. Ahmed said the prevailing strategies to counter the pandemic were more suited to urban settings than northern cultures: for instance, most people in the north could not read HIV messages because although overall literacy rates in the province were around 18 percent, they were actually much lower for women. "Illiteracy means ignorance. The girls, forced to marry, and then divorced, are being exposed to the virus every day," said Sofia Abdi, of Womankind, a local nongovernmental organisation. "They are unaware of the risks and how to protect themselves from HIV/AIDS transmission." The harsh climatic conditions of northern Kenya mean people are forced to compete for limited food and water, making ethnic violence, food insecurity, drought and poverty endemic. "My father was killed, our livestock stolen ... I had no alternative but to sell my body," said Halima Wario, a young HIV-positive woman who takes care of her three sisters. "Two months after the attack, I moved and started [commercial sex] work." The chairperson of the cultural women's group in the northwestern town of Samburu, Rebecca Lolosoli, said many women contracted the virus during attacks on their families, and the health consequences of insecurity needed to be taken into consideration. Womankind's Abdi said violence or disease often left impoverished, illiterate women at the head of young households that needed feeding, clothing and education, which exacerbated the HIV burden on women. Most girls undergo female genital mutilation, which also exposes them to the risk of contracting HIV. "The campaigns and awareness are not enough; women from this region need to be supported and empowered with skills to protect them against relying on men," she said. "The young girls need to be taken to school and prevented from early forced marriages; many are becoming widows at a very early age." na/kr/kn/he [ENDS]

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Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has congratulated Dr Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor Sheikh Mustapha for being picked as Malaysia's first angkasawan (cosmonaut) who will go on a space mission tomorrow. "I wish to congratulate him. I'm very happy that our man has been chosen for this special mission into space. I hope that he'll do well ," he told reporters after chairing the Iskandar Regional Development Authority (IRDA) board meeting here today. "I'm sure the Russians know best after having conducted the test. They have done everything they could to ensure that the person who is finally selected for the mission will be the one who is capable of performing the task that is assigned to him," he said. Dr Sheikh Muszaphar was picked by the Russian Space Agency (Roscosmos) selection panel to join American Commander Peggy Whitson and Russian flight engineer Yuri Malenchenko for the space mission that will blast off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 7.21pm local time (9.21pm Malaysian time) . The 35-year-old orthopaedic surgeon from Seremban will spend 10 days on the International Space Station. Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said Dr Sheikh Muszaphar was chosen on merit , his suitability to become an angkasawan and ability to conduct scientific experiments during his space sojourn. ( Bernama ) ***** We too should offer our congratulations to the successful angkasawan . This blog wishes Dr Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor Sheikh Mustapha all the very best in this space trip and may God protect him and his fellow crew members throughout the historic and momentous journey. Indeed we should all be very, very proud that a Malaysian has finally made it to space and may this be the beginning of a new era of space research and innovation in Malaysia. Image - Source Labels: Malaysian Astronauts. cheap viagra generic viagra online buy cilais buy cheap cialis

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