The AIDS epidemic

Despite the significant advances in the treatment of AIDS with protease inhibitors and other new drugs, we were reminded at the end of last year that the AIDS epidemic is far from over. A report prepared to coincide with World AIDS Day on 1 December 1997 (Report on the Global HIV/AIDS Epidemic, United Nations, 1997) in fact suggests that there have been serious underestimations made of the epidemic: currently, according to United Nations figures, the prevalence of HIV positivity is 1% among sexually active individuals on a worldwide scale and 16 000 new infections occur each day. These are startling figures and should give cause for concern since much of the new disease occurs in countries with poor economic access to the new therapies. In addition, the UN office indicates that although some of the previously lower figures were based on less accurate data collection, the new figures suggest that a significant proportion of individuals may be unaware that they are HIV positive. Thus, public health campaigns to control the disease may need to rethink their strategies.

Global estimates of HIV/AIDS infection at current infection rates indicate that around 50 million individuals will be infected by the year 2000. The annual rate of AIDS deaths is rising by 50% per annum and a significant proportion of these individuals are children. In fact, the infection rate among children is as high as 10% of the sexually active adult rate. AIDS is thus a disease of young people, with serious demographic implications. The UN has initiated a campaign (UNAIDS) to provide access to the new drugs to developing countries particularly certain parts …