Boost routine testing of drug users to prevent spread of AIDS

The spread of HIV and AIDS among millions of people could be slowed if addicts who inject drugs are treated as medical patients rather than as criminals, says the International Federation of the Red Cross.

More than 80 percent of the world's governments "are inclined to artificial realities, impervious to the evidence that treating people who inject drugs as criminals is a failed policy that contributes to the spread of HIV", it says.

An estimated 16 million people worldwide inject drugs, mainly because it delivers the fastest, most intense high, in what has become a growing trend on every continent, according to the Red Cross.