KULOB, July 25, 2011, Asia-Plus — Help office for injecting drug users (IDUs) at the Kulob branch of Tajikistan’s Red Crescent Society (RCS) will be closed due to lack of financing, Zayniddin Olimov, executive director of RCS’s branch in Kulob said.
According to him, they were receiving financial support for functioning of the help office from the Delegation of the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) in Tajikistan.
“We understood from an official letter that financing is stopped in connection with expansion of areas of local wars and conflicts in the world, because IFRC now has to send all free and attracted funds there,” Olimov said, noting that Tajikistan’s RCS is not able to keep the help office for IDUs on its own.
In the meantime, two specialists and three outreach work volunteers working with the help office for IDUs in Kulob have reportedly detected 150 IDUs, with seven of them being HIV sufferers, in a short period of time. The office has conducted seminars for IDUs and distributed medical supplies (disposable syringes and contraceptives) received through the Global Fund among the injecting drug users, Olimov said.
“If we do not find donor or sponsor as soon as possible, these 150 IDUs will be left without proper aid and moral support,” he stressed.
