Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2006. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Los Angeles Times (06.05.06) - Tuesday, June 06, 2006
Thomas H. Maugh II, Jia-Rui Chong
"The low-hanging fruits have all been picked. and we still face huge challenges," said Dr. David Ho of the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center in New York. "This is not because of a lack of effort or because of a lack of money. It's just a fundamental problem posed by HIV."
In the United States since 1981, more than half a million people have died from HIV/AIDS complications. According to CDC, an estimated 15,000 will die from them this year. More than 1 million people in the United States have HIV/AIDS, and 40,000 contract it each year.
African Americans, some 13 percent of the population, account for half of new US infections and one-third of deaths. Black males are seven times as likely as white males to have HIV; black females are 20 times as likely to be infected as white females.
Worldwide, at least 25 million people have died from AIDS, and 2.8 million will die this year, according to the World Health Organization. An estimated 38.6 million people have HIV/AIDS, and an additional 4.1 million are infected each year in what Dr. Kevin Fenton, head of AIDS programs at CDC, called "one of the deadliest epidemics in human history."
"We are the last generation to know what life in a world without AIDS was really like," said Dr. James Curran, who was among the first at CDC to study the disease, and who is currently dean of Emory University's Rollins School of Public Health.
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