ABSTRACT
There are many aspects involved, including ideological and moral barriers. To conduct youth prevention programmes, one would need to admit that teenagers start to have sexual contacts at an early age. Of course, we have left the times behind us, when we said that there is no sex in the Soviet Union. However, there is still no realistic view on sex education. To engage in HIV/AIDS prevention for drug users, on the other hand, one would need to admit that drug use is a real problem in Russia. One would need to adopt a pragmatic approach and recognise that we need harm reduction and drug rehabilitation programmes. One would actually need to change a lot [in Russia’s HIV/AIDS policy]. This is not happening.
