JOHANNESBURG, Nov 21 (AFP) - African governments must urgently expand HIV/AIDS prevention programs, UN officials said Monday as an annual report on the global AIDS crisis showed sub-Saharan Africa as the hardest-hit.
"We need to bring a sense of urgency to HIV prevention," said Innocent Ntaganira, the World Health Organisation's representative for Africa.
"We need national programs to scale up effectively prevention," he said.
While sub-Saharan Africa has just over 10 percent of the world's population, it is home to more than 60 percent of all people living with HIV, 25.8 million people, according to the latest AIDS epidemic update released on Monday.
In 2005, an estimated 3.2 million people became newly infected while 2.4 million adults and children died of AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa, according to the report.
"It is morally unacceptable and indefensible to allow millions of people to die when the medication exists," said Ntaganira.
At least 85 percent of South Africans in need of antiretrovirals (ARVs) were not yet receiving them by mid-2005, the report said, while 90 percent or more of those with advanced AIDS were unable to access the drugs in Ethiopia, Ghana, Lesotho, Mozambique, Nigeria, Tanzania and Zimbabwe.
UN AIDS regional director Mark Stirling commended government for their efforts in fighting the pandemic, saying they were showing "much more interest in trying to make things work."
"I think that needs to be continued," he said.
While Kenya, Uganda and Zimbabwe have reported declines, HIV/AIDS appears to be on the rise in Mozambique and Swaziland, while South Africa's AIDS crisis shows no signs of abating, according to the report.
In southern Africa, the epicenter of the global AIDS crisis, HIV infection levels among pregnant women are 20 percent or higher in six countries: Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland and Zimbabwe.
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