An alarming story on the front page of l-orizzont on Friday maintained that a possibly frightening number of immigrants appear to have HIV. Seven, it was claimed, are HIV positive.

Although seven does not seem like an enormous number of HIV positive people, this number could be misleading because, very shortsightedly in my opinion, not to use a much stronger word, we don’t test all irregular immigrants for the whole gamut of infectious diseases when they arrive.

We just know about these seven because they happened to need to go to hospital for other reasons and they were found to be HIV positive. Obviously, our fantastic hospital staff ensure they protect themselves, but what about the workers and soldiers in detention centres, what about other immigrants, what about the general population, what about the children in our schools?

HIV can only be transmitted through sex and needles, it is true, but these immigrants could have wives and partners, be pregnant with children or planning to have them while they are HIV positive. Is there not a duty to protect, to inform, to treat?

And let’s be clear. Just like Maltese men and women marry foreigners, it is only a matter of time before the irregular immigrants who stay here start to meet and marry Maltese women and men too? Some, who are genuine refugees, are here to stay and we have to accept that.

So the only reason we know about these seven is because they may have gone into hospital for other reasons and then they were screened for something else and HIV was found. Isn’t this the wrong approach from our health authorities? If seven are HIV positive from the minority of immigrants who are admitted to hospital, the total number could be very much higher. Shouldn’t the health authorities know?

It is essential that we take all steps to ensure that both HIV or other diseases common in the African continent do not get a grip here too. It seems amazing that when immigrants come from countries where HIV is widespread, we are not checking them.

It is a huge disservice to them and to us as well. I am not sure the front page of a newspaper is where these things should be said as it could fan racism, but then we have had the problem of irregular immigrants for quite a long time, and any health issues and problems cannot be ignored, even though some would call certain health protection policies racist.

Still, I think we had better have our eyes wide open on this issue.

There was all this panic by the Health Authorities last year about bird flu. And I, for one, was glad they took it seriously and apparently we were one of the better-prepared countries and prosit for that. But why are we being so complacent about this? It’s not just HIV. There are potentially some very nasty diseases in Africa, which are not only transmitted by sex and it is imperative that public health is protected. We give all our children jabs to ensure they don’t fall prey to certain diseases, don’t we?

Why are we not then protecting our population, and all the other irregular immigrants who live with these HIV positive people or people with other infectious diseases by screening? Don’t the immigrants who are cooped up with each other deserve to know? Don’t we deserve to know? Don’t these immigrants deserve to be treated if they are HIV positive?

Recently, a certain M. Ellul, a senior health official took me to task for my daring to criticise their “boob is best” campaign, when in fact my article was totally about the Archbishop’s remarks about women making the noble choice to stay at home and not anti-breastfeeding, which I managed to do myself, though I don’t feel remotely superior about it. She completely misunderstood my point so let me make sure spokespersons for our health authorities are clear this time.

Protect our general population not only with “boob is best” campaigns, but by preventing diseases from the African continent from getting into Malta and spreading, by screening all irregular immigrants for all possible diseases, both for their protection and treatment and for others.

Can HIV be transmitted through breastfeeding too? Hopefully not. Or probably just by bleeding nipples. So many women try to breast-feed and suffer and give up. It would be nice for health authorities to acknowledge that, rather than organise holier than thou campaigns while other health threats are not taken good care of.

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