Minister the Hon. Quinton Edness said this week.

The Minister was commenting on a report this month by the US National Commission on AIDS which concluded the spread of AIDS was spurred by discrimination.

The report to the White House stated that efforts to deal with the epidemic in the US were being hampered by discrimination, poverty and lack of health services.

The advisory commission said AIDS should be treated as a racial issue.

Its report said black and Hispanic Americans accounted for 46 percent of US AIDS cases.

It warned the battle against AIDS could be lost if prevention and treatment programmes aimed at ethnic groups were not reinforced.

Since AIDS was identified in the early 1980s, 242,146 cases have been reported in the US and 158,243 people have died.

An estimated one million Americans are believed to be infected with the AIDS virus.

The main victims have been homosexual men and intravenous drug users, with the number of heterosexuals and women increasing -- similar to Bermuda where close to 200 people have died of AIDS.

But Mr. Edness said: "Bermuda does not have that kind of problem.'' He said the spread of AIDS on the Island was mainly due to lifestyle.

"We have a higher educated public who understand the information (about AIDS),'' he said.

"In Bermuda everybody knows about AIDS. Everybody knows that they should try and protect themselves.'' But, he said, there were still segments of the population who had not been sufficiently motivated to change their lifestyles.

"That is true at all social levels,'' he said. "That is why education in the community has to be constant.

"We're beginning to feel that we have to reach parents and encourage them to talk to their children about AIDS.

"In schools and churches people must be able to talk to kids about this subject. We think that more people need to be trained to talk about it.'' Mrs. Carolyn Armstrong, director of the AIDS-support group STAR, and Agape House co-ordinator Mrs. Hilary Soares agreed the local spread of AIDS was mainly due to lifestyle.

"I know that people have died of AIDS here from wealthy families,'' Mrs.

Soares said. "AIDS is no respecter of persons.'' "We cannot compare ourselves to the US when talking about the spread of AIDS,'' Mrs. Armstrong said. "Bermuda experiences the virus across the board.

"And if people's perception of AIDS does not change, things will become worse in Bermuda. It has nothing to do with race, age or creed.'' Both Mrs. Soares and Mrs. Armstrong agreed with the commission's recommendation that called for support foster care programmes for children with HIV infection and non-infected youngsters orphaned by the loss of parents to AIDS.

Mrs. Armstrong said: "In 1992 we broadened our focus to include orphans. We, particularly Mr. and Mrs. Alvin Wilson (the STAR assistant director and his wife), have been doing much groundwork to see how we can start up such a ministry''.

While most children who lose their parents to AIDS are taken in by family, Mrs. Armstrong said this was not always the case.

"We are going to try hard to put something in place for these children,'' she said.