Prostitutes on the tourist island of Bali say they are being unjustly blamed for the spread of Aids into the mainstream community, after a recent report said as many as one in four sex workers there had HIV.
According to a survey by Udayana University epidemiologist Professor Dewa Nyoman Wirawan - an expert on HIV/Aids and founder of local NGO Yayasan Kerti Praja (YKP) - some 673, or 1.2 per cent, of the pregnant women on the island last year were carrying the virus, and 380 infants were born infected.
The National AIDS Commission this month said 25 per cent of the 8,800 known prostitutes on Bali were infected with HIV, an increase of two percentage points from a year earlier.
YKP programme manager, Dewa Suyetna, said: 'Housewives are being infected by their husbands, who visit the numerous brothels of the island.'
Sex worker Dewi Lestari, 34, from East Java, has been in Bali for eight years. She said: 'I am worried about HIV/Aids. I always ask customers politely to use condoms. I try my best ... But it is not always possible. I have had bad experiences with customers, who first agree to use a condom, but once they are in the bedroom, they refuse. Some get angry, shout at me, insult me and even get violent.'
Sumiati, 37, mentioned another constraint. 'Sometimes I just have no money at all, and I cannot afford to send customers away [if they refuse to wear a condom],' she said. 'But I am always worried and at times I pray that I do not get infected.'
Sumiati, also from East Java and in Bali since 2000, estimated 'roughly 70 per cent' of her customers use condoms.
