Causecast

by SARAH NELSON, Contributing Writer

New statistics released this week by the World Health Organization report a slowing trend in new HIV infections, particularly in the last decade. New cases are down more than 17 percent globally from what they were eight years ago. The 2009 AIDS Epidemic Update also reports that approximately 33.4 million people worldwide are living with HIV, while deaths directly related to AIDS have dropped about ten percent since 2004.

The U.N. believes that the increased availability of treatment, education, and HIV programs have made a tremendous contribution to the hopeful statistics. The report also concludes that, since 1996, 2.9 million lives have been saved because of the availability of HIV antiretroviral therapies. Integrating treatment and prevention programs into existing social and health services have also had a positive impact on decreasing prevalence of the disease.

The WHO and UNAIDS are hopeful that, as long as funding continues to stay on track, and programming stays up-to-date with changes in the epidemic, the decreases will continue to build momentum. WHO Director, Dr. Margaret Chan remarked that, “International and national investment in HIV treatment scale-up has yielded concrete and measurable results…We cannot let this momentum wane,” said Dr. Chan. “Now is the time to redouble our efforts, and save many more lives.”

The report also shows the evolution of the epidemic and warns that prevention effort must keep up with the shift. Current education in Asia characterizes the highest risk of infection by transmission through participation in the sex industry and sharing needles. The epidemic is increasingly affecting heterosexual couples. In Eastern Europe, new infections are on the rise, not among needle users, but among their sexual partners.

The report urges an expansion of demographic-specific prevention programs targeted at people over 25, married or committed couples as well as widowers and divorces. Currently, programs geared toward these groups are limited, yet they are the groups in which HIV infections are most prevalent in sub-Saharan Africa.

HIV/AIDS continues to affect people of all ages, ethnicity, socio-economic conditions and sexual orientations. Recognizing the need to better connect the 33.4 million individuals infected with HIV, the U.N has established an online community to educate on the disease and provide a community for those living with it.

Get involved in the effort to end the global AIDS epidemic. The easiest thing you can do is get tested. Know your status.

Support an AIDS campaign. You can donate to the UNAIDS fund or support a local HIV program in your area.

Check out Keep A Child Alive to find out how you can get involved in their effort to provide antiretroviral treatments to children affected by HIV/AIDS in Africa.

Photo by Sully Pixel, flickr.