Minister of Health Dr Kyaw Myint on Wednesday told a press conference in Naypyidaw that Burma is winning the fight against HIV/AIDS, citing a drop in the number of cases over the past five years.

Referring to statistics that show infections dropped from 1.5 percent in 2000 to 1.3 percent last year, Kyaw Myint denied that Burma’s HIV/AIDS epidemic constituted a threat to international peace and security, one of the arguments used as part of the US-led effort to address Burma at the UN Security Council.

“HIV prevalence in Myanmar [Burma] has reduced,” he told gathered members of the government, press and the humanitarian community.

Despite claims of progress by the regime, privately it still appears to be highly concerned by the epidemic. Burmese Prime Minister Soe Win told his Thai counterpart Surayud Chulanont in a meeting in Naypyidaw this month that HIV in Burma is widespread and that there was a lack of experts in the country to solve the problem.

In response, Surayud said his government was ready to help and provide its own expertise, a Thai Government House press statement said.

While the UN’s recently released HIV/AIDS survey for 2006 says “there are early indications that the epidemic [in Burma] might be diminishing,” it adds that the country is still “experiencing a serious epidemic.”

The report says the 1.3 percent infection rate as cited by the Burmese health minister applies only to adults, or those aged over 24 years old, compared to a rate of 1.4 percent in 2003. For young people aged 15 to 24 years old, the UN estimates an HIV prevalence rate of 2.2 percent, which it describes as “a cause for serious concern.”

In addition, some 43 percent of injecting drug users and 32 percent of sex workers were found to be HIV positive in 2005, “proportions that have changed little since 2000,” the report says. Dr Kyaw Myint made no mention of this data during his speech on Wednesday.

The UN does, however, point to some notable successes in tackling the disease in Burma. HIV infection levels among pregnant women have declined from 2.2 percent in 2000 to 1.3 in 2005, studies show. Similarly, among men seeking treatment for other sexually transmitted diseases, eight percent were HIV positive in a 2001 study, compared to just four percent last year.

Burma has also recently introduced programs that the UN believes will help aid the fight against HIV/AIDS, as referred to by the health minister. A methadone program as a replacement for heroine users was piloted in February this year in Rangoon, Mandalay, Lashio and Myitkina.

Similarly, an education program on safety was offered to injecting drug users for the first time with the support of international non-governmental organizations working in Burma, along with 1.1 million disposable syringes, in 2005.

Nevertheless, it was not until the same year that public sector antiretroviral treatment was offered to HIV-positive people in Burma, and only in 2004 that safety was achieved nationwide on blood stocks, the health minister said. Just over 95 percent of supplies transfused were tested the same year.

An external UN review of Burma’s HIV/AIDS program conducted in March and April this year-the first for more than a decade-also shows mixed results. A copy of the findings circulated at a conference on HIV/AIDS in Toronto, Canada in August, as posted on the HIV Information for Myanmar website, shows that “significant progress has been achieved in the health sector in Myanmar [Burma] by the national response to HIV/AIDS.”

“These accomplishments deserve recognition. But much work is still needed for the NAP [National AIDS Program] to achieve the greatest possible impact,” it adds.

Describing Burma as “one of the countries hardest hit by the HIV epidemic in Asia,” the appraisal says that the national program to fight the virus is under funded and severely short-staffed, particularly at the township level. Similarly, health centers were found to be lacking adequate equipment and a reliable electricity supply.