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They will for sure if they take AIDS drugs.

A standard anti-retroviral drug course costs about $10,000 a year for each AIDS patient. They also have to take the drugs for the rest of their lives, so that's an average cost of about $120,000. How is an impoverished country like Russia going to pay for the drug treatment of 4 million or so AIDS patients? Its diffcult enough for AIDS patients in the USA and Britain to get drug therapy.

I'd say unless the Russians start some serious publicity campaigns their economy will be crippled by the expense of treating all the new AIDS cases.

And again, David, your credibility to be shot out of the water....But one of the new regions of greatest concern is eastern Europe, and Russia in particular, where experts predict more than a million people will be infected by HIV within two years.

And this from your own BBC. Is it possible for you to get even one statistic correct?

There are now almost 70,000 cases of full blown Aids registered with the National Aids Centre in Russia - compared to just over 5,500 last year Another quote for you. Though the article is from 2000 it estimates that (and these are the pessimistic estimates) by 2002 there will be 2 million infected.

It says: "In this era in which few young gay men have seen friends die of Aids, and some mistakenly view anti-retrovirals as a cure, there is growing complacency about the HIV risk..."

Here by the way is a quote on homosexual issues.