New York Times 25nov00
Geneva -- An estimated 5.3 million people, including 600,000 children under age 15, were infected with HIV/AIDS this year, the World Health Organization said yesterday.
This is the first year that the number of new infections in sub-Saharan Africa appeared to have stabilized, but that was offset by increases in morbidity -- the rate the disease was contracted among those with HIV -- and mortality in the same region during 2000.
An estimated 3.8 million people in the region were newly infected with HIV this year as opposed to a total of 4 million there during 1999. The region is home to about one-10th of the world's population but remains the world's hardest hit. Not only did it account for 72 percent of new HIV infections last year, but the region also had 70 percent of the people living with HIV/AIDS and 80 percent of the AIDS deaths in the past year, according to WHO's Weekly Epidemiological Record.
Worldwide, a total of 36.1 million adults and children are estimated to be living with HIV/AIDS. The adults are split almost equally between men and women, with an estimated 18.2 million men between 15 and 49 living with the fatal disease, the U.N. health agency said.
In the two decades since AIDS was recognized as a disease, an estimated 21. 8 million adults and children have died from it. Of those, an estimated 3 million died this year. The numbers of women dying have continued to increase, accounting for an estimated 52 percent of such adult deaths this year, the WHO said.
Overall, the number of new HIV infections in these countries "has remained relatively constant over the past few years," it said. WHO statistics showed that the United States and Canada had an estimated 920,000 people living with HIV/AIDS, with approximately 45,000 new cases this year.
People who injected drugs were responsible for most of the new infections in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, the report said.
World Health Organization: 3 million AIDS deaths in 2000
NAOMI KOPPEL, AP 24nov00
GENEVA -- HIV cases in the former Soviet bloc will rise by 60 percent this year as the worldwide number of people infected by the virus that causes AIDS tops 36 million, the World Health Organization said Friday.
The U.N. health body said there are an estimated 250,000 new cases in eastern Europe and central Asia this year, bringing the total there to 700,000.
``Most of the infections continue to occur among injecting drug users,'' WHO said, noting that the AIDS epidemic only hit the region in the 1990s following the fall of communism.
The estimates by WHO and UNAIDS, contained in a weekly report released ahead of a major study on the disease next week, said there will be around 5.3 million new cases of HIV infection this year -- including 600,000 children under 15 -- and 3 million people will die from AIDS. Sub-Saharan Africa continues to be the worst-hit region, with 72 percent of the new infections and 80 percent of the deaths in the past year, according to the report.
It predicts that the region will have 25.3 million people with HIV/AIDS by the end of the year, 55 percent of them women. That would mean that 8.8 percent of all adults there would be HIV positive.
An estimated 6.4 million people in Asia and the Pacific will be HIV positive, WHO said. But, it noted, most of those infections are in a few large countries in south and southeast Asia.
``While prevalence in the adult population continues to be relatively low in many Asian countries, available behavioral data suggests an increased vulnerability,'' it said, citing the importance of the sex trade, use of illicit drugs and large population movements.
In the industrialized countries of North America, Western Europe and the Pacific, an estimated 1.5 million people will be living with HIV by the end of the year.
``While the availability of antiretroviral therapy has continued to reduce progression to AIDS, deaths and HIV transmission from mother to child, the number of new HIV infections has remained relatively constant over the past few years,'' WHO said.
The agency expects 45,000 new cases in North America and 30,000 in Western Europe.
``By the end of 2000, it is estimated that a total of 21.8 million adults and children will have died because of HIV/AIDS since the beginning of the epidemic,'' WHO said. ``Mortality due to HIV continued to increase, with an estimated 3 million deaths during 2000. Deaths in women also continue to increase, accounting for an estimated 52 percent of adult deaths due to HIV in 2000.''
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