Shahzad Tahir

Injecting Drug Use and the Risks of Hiv Infection: a Case Study of Hiv and Aids Awareness in the Red Light District of Pakistan Shahzad Tahir

The infamous red-light district of Lahore, Pakistan, Heera Mandi, also known as Shahi Mohullah (The Royal Neighborhood), ever since its existence, has been famous for dancing girls and music. Over the years Heera Mandi transformed into sex industry and from the last few decades it has become a concentration of drug users and more recently the injecting drug users. Prostitution coupled with the injecting drug usage may facilitate the HIV infection, causing AIDS. This book, based on the behavioral research conducted in the red light area adds a new perspective to the existing literature on Heera Mandi. It contributes invaluable information by exploring the nature, context and extent of links between drug users, sex workers and their clients, in the context of HIV transmission. Book will especially be useful to policy makers, analysts, researchers, social workers and administrators, especially in the public health sectors. It is highly courageous initiative from a talented researcher, who had the passions to touch such sensitive subject in a highly close-door society having a rigid religious orientation, paving the way forward for subsequent research scholars.