India battles AIDS epidemic

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- India now has the largest number of AIDS infections as the spread of the disease shows no sign of letting up a quarter-century into an epidemic that has claimed 25 million lives, the UN reported yesterday .

``I think we will see a further globalization of the epidemic spreading to every single corner of the planet," said UNAIDS head Dr. Peter Piot.

The data released by UNAIDS shows that India has the largest number of people living with HIV/AIDS. With an estimated 5.7 million infections, it has surpassed South Africa's 5.5 million.

But the epidemic still remains at its worst in sub-Saharan Africa, where per capita rates continue to climb in several countries. A third of adults were infected in Swaziland in 2005. By comparison, India's per capita rate is low, at 0.9 percent of its 1.02 billion people.

The 630-page UNAIDS report released yesterday documents countries' progress and failures, and projects what must happen to keep some regions from experiencing disaster. The agency report was released a day ahead of a high-level meeting on AIDS in New York, and a week prior to the 25th anniversary of the first documented AIDS cases on June 5, 1981.

Nearly 40 million people are living with HIV/AIDS.

Piot said in an interview that one of the report's most disturbing findings was how few babies are being protected against infection. Only 9 percent of pregnant women in poor countries are receiving services, such as access to drugs, to help prevent mother-to-child transmission, despite a UNAIDS goal of 80 percent coverage.

``The thing I'm most disappointed with and surprised about is prevention of mother-to-child transmission," Piot said. ``For HIV, the coverage is still very low and we didn't meet the target. ``Here we have something that is non-controversial; it's about saving the babies."

Women's vulnerability to the disease continues to increase, with more than 17 million women infected worldwide -- nearly half the global total -- and more than three-quarters of them living in sub-Saharan Africa, the report found.

Piot said the situation in sub-Saharan Africa remains dismal, where 24.5 million people were infected and home to nearly 90 percent of the world's children living with the virus.

South Africa remains one of the world's most tragic situations with nearly one in three pregnant women testing HIV-positive in public antenatal clinics in 2004. Nearly 19 percent of adults were infected nationwide last year, and the per capita rate is continuing to climb.

But Piot said the new numbers do offer a small sliver of hope. Kenya and Zimbabwe, along with some cities in Burkina Faso, reported declines in the overall percentage of adults infected.

In India, officials said there are signs of hope despite the huge number of infections.

Intensive AIDS prevention efforts among prostitutes and the men who frequent them have pushed down HIV infections dramatically in four south Indian states, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu.

The UNAIDS report said the decline in HIV prevalence in those states was in 15- to 24-year-old pregnant women, where the rate fell from 1.7 percent in 2001 to 1.1 percent in 2004.

A recent University of Toronto study in those states credited efforts by authorities and non-governmental groups to educate sex workers.