[AIDS and Islam]

There is very little information available on AIDS in Muslim countries. The World Health Organization (WHO) relies on government figures, but it concedes that these are far from accurate. At the beginning, many Muslim countries refused to provide statistics to WHO, and although under-reporting still continues, they have begun to accept the presence of the disease. In the absence of concrete data, many Muslim countries take solace in the widely accepted belief that Islamic cultural values provide a degree of protection against AIDS. And certainly, some studies show that Muslims living in traditional societies appear less likely to contract virus. It is the truth that Islam promotes a line of behaviour for HIV/AIDS prevention. But theory is not necessarily put into practice. Faced with an international pressure, most of the governments in Muslim countries have set up their AIDS control programmes today.