Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2001. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
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United Press INternational - Friday, 17 August 2001
South Africa already had four million HIV/AIDS patients by December 2000.
"Between 5.3 and 6.1 million would suffer from HIV/AIDS by 2005, and 6 million to 7.5 million by 2010," said a government sponsored research, titled 'Impending Catastrophe Revised.
A joint United Nations and the World Health Organization program on HIV/AIDS estimates that by December last year the world had more than 36 million people infected with HIV, 34.7 million adults and 1.4 million children.
In South Africa, almost 25 percent of women aged between 15 and 19 would become infected between 1995 and 2010. In comparison, only five percent of men in that age group would fall victim to the virus, the report said.
However, the male ratio increases to 14.5 percent, still a half percent less than women, in the next age group of 20 to 24.
"Women are at greater risk of infection due to biological, social and economic factors," says the report published in South Africa's The Star newspaper.
By 2005 there will be about one million AIDS orphans under the age of 15 in South Africa, rising to 2.5 million in 2010. The majority of these orphans would be children over the age of four, the report says.
AIDS deaths are projected to rise from 120,000 a year in 2000 to between 354,000 and 383,000 in 2005. It could increase to between 545,000 and 635,000 deaths in 2010.
Other estimates are much higher. Quoting another study, the newspaper said that AIDS might cause as many as 800,000 deaths in 2010.
"Already half of all adult deaths in South Africa can be attributed to AIDS and it will further increase if not checked," the report said.
It estimates that a 15 percent increase in condom use would result in a decrease of 150,000 HIV/AIDS cases among people aged between 20 and 25 by 2015.
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