Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2006. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2006. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Reuters NewMedia - November 21, 2006
Here are some key facts from the latest annual report by the two United Nations agencies:
*Two thirds of those infected -- 24.7 million people -- live in sub-Saharan Africa, which also accounts for almost 75 percent of deaths -- 2.1 million out of the global toll of 2.9 million.
*But the biggest infection increases were in east Asia and in central Asia/eastern Europe.
*In south and southeast Asia there are 7.8 million people living with HIV and there were 860,000 new infections in 2006. For eastern Europe and central Asia the combined figures were 1.7 million HIV cases and 270,000 new infections.
* High-risk behaviour (injecting drug use, unprotected paid sex and unsafe sex between men) is especially evident in the HIV epidemics of Asia, eastern Europe and Latin America.
* In China, with an estimated 650,000 people living with HIV, the virus is gradually spreading from high-risk groups to the general population. The HIV epidemic from drug use accounts for half of the cases and has reached "alarming proportions".
*More women than ever are living with HIV -- 17.7 million, up one million on 2004, the year the report uses for comparison.
*Less than 1 in five people at risk of catching HIV worldwide has access to basic prevention services. Only 1 in 8 of those wanting to be tested can be.
*More than 1.6 million people living with HIV are receiving anti-retroviral treatment in low and middle income countries, four times more than in Dec. 2003. But that is still just 24 percent of those in need of the life-extending drugs.
*Scaling up available prevention strategies in 125 low and middle income countries would avert 28 million new infections by 2015 and save $24 billion in treatment costs.
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