Most HIV Carriers in Papua Suffer From Tuberculosis

Jayapura, Papua, April 24 (ANTARA) - Most or around 60 percent of HIV carriers in Papua also suffer tuberculosis, a local health official said. Head of the Papua health service Drg Yosep Rinta told Antara news agency here Wednesday that HIV sufferers are easily to become victim of TBC as they are less resistant to disease. On the other hand, many TBC patients, who could not be healed after long treatment, were known to have been infected with HIV, Yosep said. He said HIV cases are high in rate in Papua mainly because of frequent sex intercourse with different women or men. "There are HIV patients infected with diseases other than TBC but not many," he said. The HIV patients, therefore, need to consume anti retra virus (ARV) for life to increase their resistance other diseases mainly TBC. Currently there are 13,726 people known to have been infected by HIV and around 2,091 of them use ARV. Papua is one of areas in the country having high rate of HIV/AIDS cases.