HIV Rates Decreasing Globally November 27
There is good news to be shared as far as HIV/AIDS is concerned; Reports indicate that the rates for infection with HIV are decreasing. This change is reportedly the fruit of more powerful drugs as well as an increase in access to AIDS-centered care and health care facilities which has brought about a reduction in new infections with HIV by as much as 17 percent over the past eight years.
The decline is also being attributed to the fact that more people are getting tested and provided with appropriate support and care. The work however, is far from over, at least according to pioneering AIDS researcher Dr. Margaret Fischl of the University Of Miami School Of Medicine. Despite the decline in new cases as well as deaths due to the disease, the number of AIDS-related deaths is still too many for comfort.
For instance, there have been nearly 2.7 million people who were diagnosed with HIV in 2008; almost half a million, 430,000 of them, had been children. Since the disease was discovered in 1981, 25 million people have died due to AIDS.
What the study noticed, though, is that the significant improvements were felt in low-income, developing countries. Countries such as the United States and those in Europe did not exactly show very positive results. This is most probably due to the fact that appropriate care is more readily available in these countries than they are in developing countries. What this means is that there may have been a number of cases left unchecked and unidentified prior to the introduction of new techniques for treatment and testing.
Miami and For Lauderdale are two cities who are among the top 5 US cities for AIDS cases.
Tags: AIDS testing, HIV detection, HIV testing, STD testing