ABSTRACT
The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) has estimated that during 2001, 5 million people became newly infected with HIV, the vast majority of them in developing countries. In one single hour, over 500 people are infected with HIV and over 300 people die from AIDS-related diseases. Globally, some 40 million people are estimated to be living with HIV, 28.1 million of them, or 70 per cent of the total, in sub-Saharan Africa. Just 3.8 per cent live in Western Europe and North America combined (Table 12.1). The distribution of new infections in 2001 reflected the total global distribution of HIV infections. Some 3.4
million new infections in the year 2001 were in sub-Saharan Africa, 68 per cent of the total number of new infections. Only 1.5 per cent of those newly infected were to be found in Western Europe and North America. The prevalence rate is about 8.4 per cent in sub-Saharan Africa, compared with 1.2 per cent globally and 0.6 per cent for North America.1
