Bill Clinton has called for mandatory testing for HIV/AIDS in nations that have high infection rates, like Belize.

The former president said at a briefing in London Tuesday that testing is "essential to reduce the spread of AIDS," because determining people's HIV status is the best way to make them change their sexual behavior.

"I think there needs to be a total rethinking of this testing position in the AIDS community and a real push for this," Clinton said. "There is no way we are going to reduce the spread of this epidemic without more testing because 90 percent of the people who are HIV positive don't know it."

Clinton was referring to statistics from his Clinton Foundation HIV/AIDS Initiative to bring drugs and testing to poor countries, which reports that more than 90 percent of the 40 million people living with HIV do not know they are infected. Developing countries need to run at least 200 million HIV tests in the next four years, says the foundation.

Clinton added, "[But] when someone tells you there are 40 million sufferers, they're just extrapolating. If 90 percent don't even know, how can you ever reduce the number of sufferers?"

"They need to know their status," he added.

The African nation of Lesotho, where more than 27 percent of the 2.2 million population are HIV-positive and life expectancy is just 34.4 years, will be the first country to do universal testing, Reuters reports.

Clinton said Lesotho is a test case to see whether rapid tests, costing from 49 to 65 cents each, and drugs can reduce the infection rate.

"The whole idea is to treat this as a public health problem, not as some source of shame or disgrace and to keep as many people alive as possible," he explained.

He added that the key to targeting testing and aid was not whether a country was rich or poor, but its infection rate. When the rate reaches a critical point it endangers the public health system and social stability, making it more difficult to bring rates down.

NOW just WHEN is Belize going to get going on a project like this? Or do we expect too much from our government to expect them to do something positive!!! That is unless it deals with ways to make money for the members of the government????