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The city of Tomsk and its environs are home to roughly three quarters of the region’s population. It has an estimated 6,000 intravenous drug users and about 1,250 commercial sex workers.
Before 2005, the main route of HIV transmission
was through injecting drug use, but that is
changing now with 75 percent of cases in 2007
resulting from sexual contact.
The number of HIV infections is low in Tomsk when compared with
the national average. Global Fund support in the area
is aimed at halting the further spread of the disease through
prevention activities (distribution of pamphlets and condoms,
counseling and testing).
The AIDS Center is also there to give treatment (in
September 2007, 48 people were receiving treatment at the center
with Global Fund money) and social support (a place
to take a shower, to eat and to talk) to people living
with the disease. The
center also provides treatment (to prevent mother to
child transmission during pregnancy) and services to women
and babies, including the procurement of formula for
the babies.
"It's very important to provide this additional social
care, because many of our patients are underprivileged," says
Dr. Sveltara Solovieva, head of the Tomsk AIDS Center. Without
providing this service, many of her patients would spend any
extra money they had on drugs instead of on baby formula.
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