THE STRAITS TIMES FORUM Wednesday December 3, 2008 THE illuminating articles in last Saturday's Review section on HIV/Aids and 'Time to treat HIV like other diseases' on Monday have cast light on this issue and made us aware of our responsibilities.

HIV/Aids has reached pandemic proportions and infects and affects people throughout the world. The articles have highlighted the plight of victims and the alarming rise of infections here. This sexually transmitted disease crosses the lines of straight and gay, young and old, men and women and, most pathetically, innocent children.

The articles have painted a hopeful and positive scenario of education, including safe sex, early HIV testing without stigmatisation, availability and affordability of retro-viral drugs. They have indicated the dramatic drop of infections in countries that have these services in place. Any denial of any of these services will increase the spread of infection and impede treatment of HIV/Aids.

It is widely acknowledged that the message of abstinence and being faithful alone will not lower the rate of incidence of the transmission of HIV/Aids. The realistic strategy is also to promote wider use of condoms. This approach has lowered dramatically the infection rate of HIV/Aids in countries like Thailand and Cambodia.

We applaud the work of our Health Promotion Board and Action For Aids which are out in the frontlines. The services to those who are infected, especially by City Harvest, Kampong Kapor Methodist Church and Care (Catholic), are commendable. We encourage wider participation by non-government service agencies and financial support of corporate bodies so that, together, we can prevent the spread of HIV/Aids in Singapore.

We know the way to deal with HIV/Aids and bring down the infection rate, but obstacles have risen along the way.

We have to remove stigmatisation, avoid discrimination, promote education, instil public awareness and introduce affordable drugs. Unless we tackle these issues, the result will be that more and more people are left to suffer pain and misery and die a slow and lonely death.

It has become a global problem and we have to address this problem locally and act more vigorously in expanding our existing programmes of education, prevention and treatment of this disease.