HIV epidemic threatens St. Petersburg - infections may spread to Finland
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The Russian city of St. Petersburg has 29,000 registered HIV-positive residents. However, this figure may represent only one tenth of the true number of cases. The number of infections has increased rapidly, as there were only a few thousand known infections a few years ago.
According to the worst-case scenario, there will soon be half a million HIV-positive people in the city at the far end of the Gulf of Finland.
Nearly all of the HIV-positive people have received the virus by using drugs intravenously. Infections have spread to Finland as well: in south-eastern parts of the country, a few cases of HIV transmitted via sexual contact in Russia have been reported.
The spread of HIV and hepatitis infections is being battled through a joint Finnish, Swedish, and Russian project funded by the Nordic Council. The project is seeking new ways to cut the spreading of infections among substance abusers.
One key method has been to tell drug addicts about the risks of contracting diseases. "The key result from Finland and St. Petersburg is that drug users were not aware of the risks", project coordinator Päivi Puro explains.
Dimitri Ostrovski, one of the Russian participants in the project, believes that an AIDS epidemic will break out in St. Petersburg within one or two years. According to Ostrovski, a lack of cooperation between various authorities and experts remains a problem.
The number of hepatitis A infections is also growing rapidly on the Russian side of the border. In St. Petersburg, the number of infections this year has been nearly four times as large as last year.
Professor Pauli Leinikki from the Finnish National Public Health Institute maintains that the Russian epidemic is not a threat to Finland, as hepatitis A is not easily contracted. However, a Finn travelling in Russia is at risk from contaminated tap water and poor hygiene in food handling.
The National Public Health Institute recommends that all long-term visitors to Russia be inoculated against hepatitis A, but the shot is not deemed necessary for tourists.
Helsingin Sanomat
