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WorldWide
AIDS Epidemic
According to estimates from the
UNAIDS/WHO AIDS Epidemic Update (December 2004), 37.2
million adults and 2.2 million children were living with
HIV at the end of 2004. This is more than 50% higher
than the figures projected by WHO in 1991 on the basis
of the data then available.
Number of people infected during 2004, and the number of
deaths
During 2004, some 4.9 million people became infected
with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which
causes AIDS.
The year also saw 3.1 million deaths from AIDS - a high
global total, despite antiretroviral (ARV) therapy,
which reduced AIDS-related deaths in the richer
countries. Deaths among those already infected will
continue to increase for some years even if prevention
programmes manage to cut the number of new infections to
zero. However, with the HIV-positive population still
expanding the annual number of AIDS deaths can be
expected to increase for many years, unless more
effective provision of ARV medication begins to slow the
death rate. |
UK HIV/AIDS Statistics
An estimated 53,000 adults were living with HIV in the UK at the end of 2003, of whom 14,300 (27%) were unaware of their infection.
In 2004, there were 5,016 new diagnoses of HIV, contributing to a total of 68,556 since the epidemic began. The 2004 number will rise as further reports are received, and is expected to reach 7,000.
There have been 21,010 diagnoses of AIDS in the UK. It is known that at least 13,082 of these people have died. It should be noted that the difference between these figures does not provide a very accurate estimate of the number of people living with AIDS in the UK: the figure will inevitably include some people who have moved abroad after diagnosis as well as some records belonging to the same person which have not been successfully matched. |
Sub-Saharan
Africa
| Has just over 10% of the world's population, but is home to close to two-thirds of all people living with HIV--from 23.1 million to 27.9 million. In 2003 alone, between 2.6 million and 3.7 million in the region became newly infected with HIV, and there were between 2.0 million and 2.5 million AIDS deaths. Many African countries are experiencing generalized epidemics. This means that HIV is spreading throughout the general population, rather than being confined to populations at higher risk, such as sex workers and their clients, men who have sex with men, and injecting drug users. In sub-Saharan Africa, the number of people living with HIV is increasing as the total adult population is growing, with the result that adult prevalence has remained stable in recent years. Stabilized infection levels also result from rising death rates from AIDS, concealing a continuing high rate of new infections. |
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