More youth getting HIV/AIDS

NST: KOTA BARU: The high number of youth involved in drugs and unprotected sex contributed to the rising number of HIV/AIDS cases.
Health Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai said from a total of 84,630 cases of HIV/AIDS reported in the country from 1986 to last year, 78.4 per cent involved those aged between 13 and 39.
"It is enough to give us a picture that they started involvement in such high risk activity at an early age, that is while they were still at school," he said at the launching of the national level Schools Healthy Programme for Youth (Program Sihat Untuk Remaja -- Prostar) here yesterday.
The text of his speech was read by the ministry's health education director Abdul Jabar Ahmad.
Liow said a study carried out by the ministry in 2006 showed that only about 50 per cent of 12,784 respondents had a high knowledge about the transmission of the disease while of 640 respondents aged 13 and 14, only 210 were knowledgeable about it.
The minister said the government had taken proactive action in handling the issue, including ensuring at least 95 per cent of those aged between 15 and 24 received information about HIV/AIDS by 2010.
He said as youth problems were not limited to HIV/AIDS, the ministry had enlarged the Prostar programme to include other unhealthy trends like eating habits which led to obesity, smoking and lack of physical activity.
Liow said, according to the Malaysian Association for the Study of Obesity (Maso), 21.4 per cent of urban youth and 16 per cent of rural youth faced obesity problems.
"This situation has led to Prostar, which was previously known as Healthy Programme Without AIDS for Youth, to be changed to Healthy Programme for Youth without changing the initials."
Liow said the health education division was working with the Education Ministry to make the Schools Prostar accepted as a co-curriculum activity at secondary schools.
More than 100 facilitators and co-ordinators took part in the four-day convention which started on Monday.