Alcohol + sex = AIDS
Times of India, Bangalore,May 29, 1998

City tops in liquor related HIV cases

A staggering 70 per cent of HIV positive patients in Karnataka have acquired the dreaded disease in alcohol-related sexual encounters. Bangalore tops the alcohol-HIV connection list.

Of the HIV cases, 90 per cent male and 10 per cent female patients admitted to indulging in unprotected sex under the influence of alcohol. A large number of the cases in the state were among the lower income group, while in Bangalore, most of the reported cases were from slums.

In a year-long study conducted by the Freedom Foundation AIDS Facility on 90 HIV patients it was found that 63 people had contracted HIV within an year of becoming alcoholic. The project, initiated as part of a treatment for Freedom Foundation chemical dependency rehabilitation programme, found that AIDS patients were much more dependent on alcohol than on drugs.

Kart Sequeira, executive trustee and addiction therapist who works with the HIV and AIDS patients at the facility said, ``the relation between alcohol and HIV was discovered long ago and we undertook the study to find out the number of alcohol related cases in Karnataka.''

The patients were told to fill out a questionnaire with the help of a counsellor (the questionnaire was based on the test used by the John Hopkins University Hospital, USA) and the mode of contracting the disease was noted down. A majority of the patients cited unprotected sex as the reason, but added that they were inebriated at the time of the act.

Though the general Impression is that women are not as addicted to alcohol as men, several female patients who were questioned confirmed they were alcoholics.

"The reason we conducted the study was to educate these people to give up alcohol. If they had acquired HIV through the sexual route, there is every possibility that they will spread it further, once they go back to drinking. Our idea was to help them on the road to recovery so that they behave in a more responsible manner," Sequeira said.

Following treatment at Freedom Foundation, there has been a 40 per cent recovery from alcohol dependency among the patients identified by the survey. Of the 90 patients enlisted for the study, 23 had full blown AIDS and have since died.

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