AIDS AND HIV

Millions worldwide die each year from this deadly disease. Sub-Saharan Africa has been worse hit than any other area of the country by this deadly illness because they can not afford the expensive drug therapies needed to battle this disease. In this region 12 Million children have been orphaned by Aids, and by the year 2010 it is anticipated that this number will have risen to 43 Million children.

Kofi Annan, the UN Secretary of State, has long been campaigning for a global fund to fight this disease that has so far claimed 22 Million lives. Money however, is not the only problem because even with the case, the question remains as whether to invest it in money to prolong the lives of those individuals with the disease or to invest it in prevention like measures such as sexual health and condom use. A vaccine for this disease is still years away.

Region	Adults & children living with HIV/AIDS	Adults & children newly infected	Adult prevalence*	Deaths of adults & children
Sub-Saharan Africa	22.0 million	1.9 million	5.0%	1.5 million
North Africa & Middle East	380,000	40,000	0.3%	27,000
Asia	5 million	380,000	0.3%	380,000
Oceania	74,000	13,000	0.4%	1,000
Latin America	1.7 million	140,000	0.5%	63,000
Caribbean	230,000	20,000	1.1%	14,000
Eastern Europe & Central Asia	1.5 million	110,000	0.8%	58,000
North America, Western & Central Europe	2.0 million	81,000	0.4%	31,000
Global Total	33.0 million	2.7 million	0.8%	2.0 million

In 2007 it is estimated that approximately 33 million people are living with Aids. Of that amount, 30.8 million are adults and 2 million are children. In the same year, 2.7 million more people were infected with Aids, and approximately 2 million people died from the disease of which .27 million were children.

• More than 25 million people have died from Aids since 1981.
• Africa, hardest hit by the disease, has 11.6 million children who have been orphaned by this disease.
• People under the age of 25 account for half of all new HIV infections in the world.

In developing and transitional countries, 9.7 million people are in immediate need of life saving Aids drugs and only about 31% of these people are actually receiving the drugs they need.