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Where we are now
"HIV/AIDS is a disastrous and growing emergency...the worst epidemic humanity has ever faced, and its impact has become devastating to development...we must halt...HIV/AIDS through awareness, prevention, and education."
—UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, speaking at the launch of the Global AIDS Media Initiative, a project of UNAIDS, the Kaiser Foundation and a coalition of 20 media organizations worldwide with support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
Global pandemic, universal challenge At the beginning of this year when the world has lived with general knowledge of HIV/AIDS for 20-some years, it is instructive to review what we know, what actions are being taken and what the future holds. Statistics are sobering: In 2002 42 million people were living with HIV/AIDS, and there were five million new infections. An additional 45 million are projected to become infected by 2010 unless a vastly expanded program of prevention, care and treatment is implemented globally.
Sub-Saharan Africa accounts for 70% of that total. Fifty percent of infected adults are women, one-third are aged 15-24, and 14,000 people worldwide are infected daily. Fifty percent of new infections are in the 15-24 age group. In 2002 3.1 million people died; Eastern Europe had the fastest growing population infected; the Caribbean developed the highest adult infection rates outside of sub-Saharan Africa. Eighty-six percent of youth live in developing countries where HIV/AIDS is prevalent; this group also has the highest sexually transmitted infection rates. Since one-quarter of the world's population is between 15-24 years old, the need to act is imperative.
As recent as 2002 there were 800,000 new infections in children, 90% of which occurred through mother-to-child transmission, and 90% of those in sub-Saharan Africa. A recent State of the World Population Report—called Making One Billion Count: Investing in Adolescents' Health and Rights—has indicated that the youth population is rapidly becoming the most-affected generation, along with older people and women.
Current prevention measures are also failing women and girls, according to a February UNAIDS report, because they do not focus adequately on gender issues and sexual behavior, making women both more vulnerable and more crucial in halting infection rates.
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