"Nezavisimaya Gazeta", November 18, 1994, p.6

Yury MESHKOV

There are different ways of loving one's own people. On the one hand, one can behave like careful parents, who protect their child from unnecessary troubles, indigence and diseases. On the other hand, one can just hug the child until it draws its last breath.

The State Duma has recently demonstrated one more example of selfless devotion to -- literally -- vital concerns of the Russians having approved the third reading of the bill "On prevention of spreading of the disease caused by human immunodeficite virus (HIV infection) in the Russian Federation." The preamble of the bill prepared by the Public Health Committee says: "The aim of this Federal law ... is public health protection and sanitary-epidemiological safety of people..." No doubt this is a noble aim. But the way of achieving it scandalized the leaders of tourism in Russia and abroad. Sergey Shpilko, the Vice-Chair of the State Committee of Physical Training and Tourism, and Anatoly Yarochkin, the President of the "Intourist" company, visited the "NG" editorial office and told us about it.

Mr.Yarochkin admitted that the very fact of discussion of this bill he learnt from some Japanese journalists whom he met a fortnight ago. Then he addressed the Duma secretariat and received confirmation: "Yes, this bill is being discussed."

What is the way of struggle against the "20 century plague" proposed by the deputies? It is very simple: all foreigners coming to Russia should be totally examined for Aids. Article 9 of the bill claims: "According to the regulations settled by the government of the Russian Federation, foreign citizens and people without citizenship coming to Russia for work, study and ON OTHER GROUNDS (emphasized by Yu.M.), are subjected to obligatory medical examination, with the exception of the citizens of the countries with that Russia has agreements about mutual acknowledgment of medical examination certificates, in case they produce their certificates." Article 10 of the same bill adds that everybody who avoids the examination procedure, will be sent out from Russia "according to the regulations settled by the government of the Russian Federation." The deputies charged the government to settle the testing rules (the bill does not say a word about the procedure, place and periods of medical examinations).

One can simply imagine the future disorder at Russian seaports, airports and railway stations when near the brave frontier guards we will see brave nurses with syringes in their hands.

But disorder is contained in the very text of the bill. Article 7 says in particular: "Medical examination is conducted in state, municipal or private health services having a license for this kind of activities..." And further in the same Article: "A document certifying presence or absence of HIV-infection by a certain person, which presents a reason for getting certain privileges or restricting certain rights is given ... ONLY by state or municipal medical services." So, private institutions, even in case they have a license, are excluded from this process. Hence, if an Aids victim or a lucky patient deprived of this virus got the test results in the "private system" they will have to go through one more examination in "state or municipal system". Their certificates they will get there only.

However that may be, Duma's intention to subject all those coming to Russia, irrespective of the periods of their visits, to total examination resulted in sharp reaction all over the world. The leading Finnish newspaper "Helsingin Sanomat" notices that this is "the only bill on obligatory Aids testing of all foreigners including tourists." The same newspaper says that "the reaction of the foreigners working in Moscow as well professional medics was stunning."

"Not for the world shall I allow to give me an injection in any Russian clinic," a nurse of a private Western clinic in Moscow said. She has probably practically observed, how disposable syringes are used many times here.

The most interesting fact is that Russian experts in Aids expressed their negative opinion on the bill as well. "The law of this sort is rather harmful than useful," Boris Pokrovsky, the leader of Aids Prevention Center, said on this occasion.

According to Mr.Pokrovsky, the tests will take 95% of all the money given by the state for anti-Aids struggle and research work in this field.

One more aspect of the total testing suggested by Duma is the moral one. The whole civilized world treats HIV-infected as victims, not as criminals who should not be allowed to cross the frontier. Any restriction of their rights is taken sensitively by the West. The people's right for voluntary examination is recognized in the overwhelming majority of cases. Testing is obligatory only for those coming to a country for more than 6 months. So, our people's defenders were too diligent. They did not even take into account the fact that with existing equipment one has to wait for the Aids test results as long as a month sometimes. How should we then treat tourists coming to this country, say, for 5-7 days?

The Russian legislators' immorality excited the whole world of international tourism and business. The only questions addressed to the delegation of the "Intourist" society at the ASTA (American Society of Travel Agents) Congress which finished last week in Lisbon were those about the bill in preparation. Business was not talked about. On November 2 the British partners of "Intourist" warned against "dramatic consequences of this decision for tourism in Russia." On November 14 the Germans made the same. "Politours", the Spanish travel agency connected with "Intourist" by long-lasting collaboration informed with regret that it had to cancel the whole Russian program for 1995 preferring to send its customers to other countries. "We regret to interrupt our fruitful collaboration in that way."

According to Mr.Shpilko, his negotiations with Western investors promising millions of dollars of direct investments to Russian tourism were recently suspended. The reason is the same -- the Duma's Aids bill.

The work of Russian delegation at one of the most important meetings in tourist business, the tourist exchange taking now place in London, where contracts for the whole season are signed, is also under the threat of disruption.

The Chair of the State Committee of Physical Training and Tourism Shamil Tarpishchev has already received a letter from the leaders of Russian Association of Travel Agencies, who express serious anxiety of Russian and foreign tourist firms dealing with foreign tourists coming to Russia.

According to Sergey Shpilko and Anatoly Yarochkin, if the Federation Council and the President of Russia do not express their opinion on creative work of the Lower Chamber soon, Russia will be excluded from the catalogues of the biggest world's travel operators. We will lose the still vague image of our country as a tourist object. Even now only the most selfless people venture to deal with entrance tourism here. And if the number of foreign tourists comes to nought, which is quite possible under existing conditions, lots of people engaged in tourism will lose their jobs. Instead of getting currency, which is required for anti-Aids activities in particular, the hotels and tourist complexes will remain empty. And the frontier medics will catch at Sheremetyevo the rare enthusiasts who long for getting an injection at the very first moment of their presence in Russia.

Why did not the deputies consult the experts in tourism before they started these world-wide medical initiatives?