RFID: A real solution to prevent spread of AIDS?

Filed in archive Healthcare on November 26, 2008

Photo courtesy of iStockphoto, Image# 387925

I would rate this as one of the weirdest use of technology if it gets the approval!!! Papua province of Indonesia is in the process of passing a law which would require HIV patients to be implanted with microchips in order to prevent infection from spreading to others. As per the authorities infected patients who exhibited active sexual behavior would be implanted with microchip to keep a watch on their behavior.

This is what lawmaker John Manangsang had to say:

It's a simple technology. A signal from the microchip will track their movements and this will be received by monitoring authorities.

What is leading to such a weird law are the fearful statistics. As per government figures the region of Papua has HIV patients whose numbers are twenty times higher than the national average of Indonesia and the reason behind these high figures is lack of education, unavailability of condoms, wife swapping rituals in some Papua tribes apart from high rate of promiscuity.

I believe even RFID would fail to deliver the goods in this situation and the only way to prevent the spread of this dreaded disease is through education as only correct information can make the Papuans to behave in a rational manner.